LIBRARY 

UNIVLHSITY  Of 
CALIFORNIA 

SAN  DIEGO 


RELIGION    AND    EXPERIENCE 


RELIGION  &  EXPERIENCE 


BY 
* 

J.    BRIERLEY,    B.A. 

("J.  B.") 

Author  of"  The  Common  Life,"  "  The  Eternal  E«ligion,"  "  Studies  oj  the  Soul," 
"  Ourselves  and  the  Universe,"  ic.,  Ac. 


Cincinnati     JENNINGS    &    GRAHAM 
New  York     EATON    &   MAINS 

1906 


Author's  Note 

THE  present  volume  is  a  study  of  religion  from 
the  standpoint  of  experience.  In  the  Introduction 
the  endeavour  is  made  to  sketch  a  philosophy  of 
experience  and  to  show  its  relation  to  the  Christian 
faith  of  to-day.  In  the  succeeding  chapters  the 
principles  of  the  Introduction  are  applied  to  the 
solution  of  some  of  the  various  religious  problems 
of  our  modern  world. 

LONDON, 

July,  1906. 


Contents 

I  I  CHAFIBB  PA0K 

—  I. — Our  New  Senses .34 

II.— The  Psychology  of  Prayer     ....       42 

uft^/7MknL--The  Religion  of  Calamity     .         .         .         .51 

-IV.— What  Was  Pentecost  ?          .         .         .         .60 

i    f          -A7.— The  Law  of  Change 68 

VI. — Religion  and  Crime 75 

VII.— Pleasure 84 

VIII.— Religion  and  Ghosts 92 

IX. — Religion  and  the  Concrete    ....     100 

X. — Doctrine  and  Life         .....     107 

XI. — Life's  Accumulations    .         .         .         .         .121 

vXlII.— Past  and  Present 128 

')*)  *•  Mklll.— When  it  is  Heaven 136 

XIV.— Fatigue        .         .         .         .         .         .         .144 

XV.— Of  Moral  Stimulants 151 

-XVI.— A  Question  of  Age       .         .         .         .         .     160 

XVII.—"  Under  Direction '-'      ....         .     168 

-XVIII.— The  Ethics  of  Victory.         ....     176 

-r-XIX.— The  Soul's  Distillations         ....     184- 

XX. — Our  Unordained  Ministry     .         .         .         .192 

XXI.— The  Solitaries      .         .         .         .         .. .  '     .     200 

XXII.— The  Broadening  of  Life        .         .         .         .208 

XXIII.— Politics  and  Religion 216 

XXIV.— A  Study  of  Backgrounds      .         .         .         .224 

.  XXV.— Concerning  Births 232 

XXVI.— Public  Meeting  Religion        ....     240 
vii 


viii  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PAG* 

XXVII.— Our  Topmost  Note 248 

—XXVIII.— The  Unpurchasables     .        .         .         .         .256 
XXIX.— The  Mind's  Hospitality         .         .         .         .264 

XXX.— Of  Religious  Union 271 

XXXI.— Of  Inner  Discipline      .         »         ...     278 
XXXII.— On  Being  Worldly       ,         .         .         .         .286 

.  .  -XXXIII.— Of  Self-Creation 294 

XXXIV.— The  Farther  Side  302 


RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 


INTRODUCTION 


IT  is  a  saying  of  Sainte  Beuve  that  "  absolute 
doctrines  in  all  matters  have  reached  their  limits, 
and  the  best  minds  are  learning  instead  from 
experience."  Nowhere  is  the  truth  of  this  dictum 
more  strikingly  exhibited  than  in  the  sphere  of 
religion.  It  is  curious  to  note  from  what  opposite 
quarters  the  appeal  to  experience  is  made.  The 
Salvationist  preacher  who  harangues  his  fellows  from 
the  street-corner  finds  here  the  ground  of  his 
exhortation.  And  the  scientist  who  endeavours 
by  exact  analysis  to  deteBSme"'the  place  of  religion 
as  a  factor  in  human  evolution  seeks  his  facts  in 
the  same  quarter.  Philosophy  from  her  side  also  isj 
busy  examining  the  contents  of  experience  in  the 
endeavour  to  ascertain  how  far  we  may  trust  its 
verdicts.  This  region  has  become,  too,  in  our  day, 
the  favourite  hunting-ground  of  the  psychologist. 
With  him  the  theme  is  studied,  not  so  much  for  the 
ultimate  questions  with  which  religion  deals,  as 
for  the  light  it  throws  upon  the  powers  and  faculties, 


2  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

the  strength  and  the  limitations  of  the  human  mind. 
Professor  James's  fascinating  volume  on  "  The 
Varieties  of  Religious  Experience  "  has  appealed 
to  every  class  of  readers.  Heterodoxy  is  as  much 
interested  in  it  as  orthodoxy.  It  offers  material 
which  the  scientist  and  the  mystic,  the  Christian 
and  the  Atheist,  may  alike  build  into  their  own 
special  thought  structure.  The  exploitation  of 
this  region  by  workers  of  such  opposite  tendencies 
is  reacting  in  a  remarkable  way  upon  current 
systematic  theology.  The  co-operation  in  the  field 
of  religious  experience  of  science  and  faith,  of 
metaphysics  and  anthropology,  is  compelling  theo- 
logians to  revise  their  whole  method  of  inquiry  and 
to  restate  their  results.  It  is  obvious  that  our 
age,  on  its  way  to  a  resettlement  of  the  grounds 
of  its  belief,  requires  first  of  all  to  see  its  way  clearly 
on  this  primary  question.  We  propose,  then,  to 
explore  a  little  on  our  own  account  a  portion  of 
this  region,  and  to  pronounce,  as  well  as  we  can, 
on  some  of  the  things  it  contains. 


II 

And  first  of  all,  what  do  we  mean  by  experience  ? 
By  experience,  taking  it  first  in  its  most  general 
sense,  we  may  be  said  to  mean  the  total  impression 
made  upon  us  by  the  world  we  live  in.  .  This 
impression,  whether  of  a  given  moment  or  of  a 
lengthened  period,  contains,  as  we  perceive,  two 
main  factors.  There  is  the  outside,  objective  fact? 
and  there  is  the  inner  mind  which  perceives  the  fact. 
And  the  thing  which  immediately  strikes  us  here  is 


INTRODUCTION  3 

the  enormous,  the  overwhelming  importance,  for 
the  proper  appraising  of  any  reported  experience, 
of  this  last  element.  The  supremely  difficult 
thing  here  is  accurately  to  estimate  the  extent  to 
which  the  outer  fact  takes  shape  and  colour  from 
the  quality  of  the  perceiving  mind.  Before 
philosophy  comes  in,  our  notions,  for  instance,  of 
the  relations  between  ourselves  and  the  outside 
world  are  of  the  crudest.  ^"One  of  the  things  about 
which  the  untrained  man  is  so  entirely  clear  is  the 
solid  earth  which  his  senses  report  to  him.  He  is'1 
so  sure  about  his  globe,  green  with  its  meadows 
in  England,  yellow  with  its  sands  in  Africa,  white 
with  its  snows  at  the  Pole.  When,  however,  he 
begins  to  reflect  a  little,  above  all  when  he  has; 
read  his  Locke  and  his  Kant,  he  finds  things  not 
quite  so  easy.  Awkward  questions  arise.  Could 
there  be  any  white  snow  or  yellow  sand  apart  from 
a  mind  which  perceives  white  or  yellow  ?  What 
is  white  or  yellow  outside  my  mind  ?  Before  he 
has  gone  far  he  discovers  that  every  perception 
of  his  outside  fact  is  a  manufactured  article,  worked 
into  shape  by  a  most  elaborate  machinery  inside 
him.  He  discovers  that  upon  each  outside  impres- 
sion there  has  been  put  the  impress  of  a  number 
of  thought-forms  supplied  by  his  own  mind.  He 
has  stamped  on  the  raw  material  offered  by  the 
senses,  ideas  of  time  and  space,  of  cause  and  effect, 
of  necessity  and  contingency  ;  ideas  which  work 
from  within,  and  shape  this  material  their  own 
way.  He  finds,  in  fact,  to  his  astonishment,  that 
he  is,  to  a  large  extent,  the  maker  of  his  own  world. 
From  this,  his  first  excursion  in  quest  of  reality, 


4  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

he  comes  back  with(j;he  conviction  that  the  one 
thing  he  does  know  something  about  is  his  own 
mind  and  its  operations.  What  is  outside  has  to 
be  taken  largely  on  faitli,) 

The  next  truth  he  learns  is  also  one  about  mind. 
His  own  mind,  he  finds,  is  not  alone.  It  is  one  of  a 
multitude  with  which  he  is  continually  in  contact. 
And  a  vitally  important  feature  in  connection  with 
these  related  minds  is  the  unity  that  obtains  among 
them.  The  impressions  made  upon  him  by  the 
outside  world  are,  he  perceives,  practically  those 
made  by  it  on  his  neighbour.  The  same  laws  are 
at  work  in  these  two  interiors.  Their  perceptions 
of  form,  of  colour,  of  extension,  of  causality,  are 
seemingly  identical.  It  is,  indeed,  through  the 
sameness  of  these  impressions,  and  of  the  inner  laws 
which  construct  them  into  ideas,  that  language, 
science  and  philosophy  have  become  possible. 
There  seems,  then,  to  be  the  same  world  outside  us 
all,  reflecting  itself  on  us  in  the  same  way. 

Our  daily  experience  in  this,  its  most  immediate 
and  constant  form,  has,  when  looked  at  in  this  way, 
given  us  two  important  results.  It  has,  in  the  first 
place,  taught  us  that  the  world  we  know  best,  the 
one  of  which  we  can  be  most  entirely  sure,  is  our 
inner  world/,  that  what  we  discern  of  an  outside 

4Ww^^B0MVi^V«M«m^^ 

universe  is  at  best  a  reflection,  an  image  cast  on  a 
mirror.  The  realities  with  which  we  are  most 
in  contact  are  invisible  and  spiritual.  The  second 
of  these  results  is  that  of  the  unity  of  this  mental 
realm,  its  community  of  impression  and  of  procedure. 
But  this,  properly  considered,  compels  us  to  a 
further  step.  How  does  this  unity  of  minds  arise? 


INTRODUCTION  5 

Is  it  a  chance,  a  fortuitous  circumstance  ?  When  we 
examine  the  leaves  on  an  oak  tree,  and  perceive  that 
each  in  the  mass  of  foliage  is  framed  on  the  same 
lines,  woven  of  the  same  material,  and  obeys  the 
same  laws  as  all  its  fellows,  we  do  not  regard  this 
as  a  chance  occurrence.  \We  see  the  reason  for 
the  leaves  being  alike  in  the  fact  that  they  are  united 
in  one  organic  whole  >,  They  are  the  same  because 
they  are  all  part  of  the  same  tree.  And  the  facts 
of  the  mental  world,  as  we  perceive  them,  point 
irresistibly  to  a  similar  conclusion.  Our  minds 
receive  the  same  impressions  and  record  the  same 
verdicts  because  they,  too,  are  part  of  an  organism.  - 
Our  separate  minds  are  leaves  of  a  tree.  They  are 
fed  from  one  source. 

The  backbone,  then,  of  reality  is  mind.  And 
the  individual  mind  subsists  by  virtue  orits  relation 
to  the  Universal  Mind.  This  does  not  mean  that 
our  mentality  is  in  any  complete  sense  a  copy  or 
expression  of  the  Mind  behind  it.  The  leaf  is  not 
the  oak.  You  could  not,  by  studying  a  leaf,  picture 
the  oak  unless  you  had  previously  seen  it.  Not 
less  is  the  one  contained  in  the  other,  and  not  less 
does  the  one  imply  the  other.  The  essential  unity 
of  mental  life  as  we  know  it,  unless  all  the  analogies 
and  all  the  methods  of  scientific  induction  are  false, 
implies  a  Basic  Consciousness  in  which  all  individual 
minds  find  their  .ground,  their  accord,  and  their 
meaning. 

The  same  result  may  be  reached  in  another  way. 
The  outside  world  becomes  intelligible  to  us  solely 
by  means  of  a  mentality  which  underlies  it,  and 
which  crops  out  of  it  at  every  point.  You  hold  any 


6  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

common  thing  in  your  hand — a  pebble,  a  lump  of 
chalk.  Your  examination  of  it,  if  it  proceed  scien- 
tifically, will  land  you  at  every  point  in  a  mental 
network.  The  relation  of  our  pebble  to  space  and 
time,  its  oneness  as  related  to  number,  its  colour, 
shape,  density,  all  these  things  have  meaning  solely 
as  related  to  perception,  to  a  mind  ;  they  are 

/  impossible,  inconceivable  apart  from  mind.  t)ur 
stone,  as  soon  as  we  begin  to  talk  of  it,  reveals  itself 

I  as  in  a  logical  universe^ 

III 

But  this  has  brought  us  a  long  way.  Our  experi- 
ence, in  placing  us  in  direct  contact  with  a  spiritual 
.  world,  real,  harmonious,  and  centring  in  a  universal 
consciousness,  has  laid  for  us  the  foundation  of 
religion.  The  next  question  is  whether  experience, 
of  the  race  or  of  individuals,  has  carried  us  any 
further.  Having  secured  us  a  foundation,  does 
*t  offer  material  for  a  solid  superstructure  ?  Do 
the  existing  structures,  or  any  one  of  them) 
contain  such  material  ?  To  narrow  our  question 
still  further,  is  Qarj&tianity  such  a  structure,  and 
if  it  is  claimed  as  such,  in  what  sense  do  we  accept 
it,  and  upon  what  grounds  ? 

We  shall,  perhaps,  in  dealing  with  these  questions, 
best  proceed  if  we  begin  with  here  and  now.  Our 
own  first  experience  of  religion  is  the  coming  into 
what  might  be  called  a  physical^  contact  with  it  as 
^  it  exists  to-day  in  our  own  country.  Here  in 
England — and  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  Western 
world  generally — the  public  is  confronted  with 
religion  as,  if  the  term  may  be  permitted,  "  a  going 


INTRODUCTION  7 

concern."  Every  one  of  us  is  related  to  it  in  this 
first  way.  We  see  the  cathedral*,  the  churches, 
the  conventicles,  in  which  its  worship  is  carried  on 
and  its  message  delivered.  We  have  read  more  or 
less  of  the  Bible,  its  sacred  Book.  We  know  some- 
thing of  the  differing  creeds  and  articles  in  which 
its  leading  doctrines  are  summarised.  We  are 
aware  of  the  divisions  between  its  followers  and 
know,  perhaps,  something  of  the  causes  of  them. 

So  far  we  have,  then,  all  of  us  a  religious  experience 
about  which  there  can  be  no  question.  It  is  one 
common  to  the  believer  and  the  unbeliever  alike. 
It  is  an  appeal  to  the  senses,  as  plain  and  palpable  * 
as  the  sun  and  moon.  But  this  of  itself  does  not 
amount  to  much.  When  we  come  to  closer  quarters* 
when  we  listen  seriously  to  the  Church's  message,  in 
creed  or  sermon,  we  have  an  experience  of  another 
kind.  We  find  ourselves  now  confronted  by  a 
series  of  statements  of  a  remarkable  character. 
Christianity  is  here  delivered  to  us  as  an  elaborate 
doctrine  concerning  God,  man,  the  world,  life, 
death,  and  what  is  after  death.  God  is  defined  in 
terms  of  a  Trinity,  as  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost ; 
there  is  a  doctrine  of  salvation,  of  the  Church,  of 
the  Sacraments,  of  the  ministry^of  the  Bible  and 
other  themes  of  the  first  class.  ^Vhat,  we  have  now 
to  ask,  is  the  relation  of  all  this  to  experience  ?J  It 
might  seem  at  first  sight  that  we  are  here  in  aliother 
region  of  things,  a  region  beyond  and  above  the 
limits  we  have  marked  out.  And  this,  indeed,  is 
the  position  of  certain  theologians,  who  exhibit  the 
Church's  dogma  as  something  more  than  experience  ; 
more  universal  than  it,  more  stable  and  trustworthy ; 


8  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

the  rule,  indeed,  by  which  the  individual  experience, 
full  as  it  is  of  limitations  and  vagaries,  is  to  be  judged 
and  corrected.  There  are,  it  is  contended,  truths 
in  the  dogma  which  transcend  experience  and 
which  appeal  to  another  standard. 

But  claims  of  this  kind,  when  carefully  examined, 
lead  always  in  the  end  to  the  same  conclusion. 
When,  for  instance,  we  are  asked  to  believe  on  the 
authority  of  the  dogma,  the  question  immediately 
arises :  "  Whence  does  the  dogma  derive  its 
authority  ?  "  If  it  be  answered  that  its  authority 
founds  itself  on  that  of  the  Church,  we  ask  again  : 
"  Wherein  lies  the  authority  of  the  Church  ?  " 
Or  if  we  are  pointed  to  the  Bible  the  same  query 
again  emerges.  And  as  we  listen  to  the  cry  of 
another  party,  "  Neither  Church  nor  Bible  is  the 
ultimate  authority ;  the  final  voice  is  that  of 
Christ " ;  the  insistent  question  once  more  offers 
itself  :  "  Whence  the  authority  of  Christ  ?  "  We 
are  at  last,  it  seems,  thrust  back  finally  on  a  question 
of  origins.  We  pass  up  through  nineteen  centuries 
of  historical  Christianity  to  its  beginnings.  But 
the  moment  we  begin  to  reflect  on  the  beginnings 
we  discover  that  all  the  contents  of  Christianity — 
its  dogma,  its  Church,  its  Bible,  its  Christ — resolve 
themselves  inevitably  into  one  question,  that  of 
experiejice.  Let  us  see  a  little  how  the  matter  stands. 

Tt  is  to  be  observed  that  the  various  claims  we 
have  just  rehearsed  really  hang  together.  Theology, 
indeed,  recognises  this.  The  orthodox  Church  in 
all  its  branches  unites  in  accepting  Christ  as  the 
supreme  authority.  It  unites  also  in  regarding  the 
Bible  as  the  true  witness  concerning  Christ's  Person, 


INTRODUCTION  9 

life  and  teaching.  It  holds  dogmas  as  its  reasoned 
statement  of  these  things.  So  that  Church,  dogma, 
Bible  and  Christ  are  all  considered  as  elements  in 
a  congruous  system. 

IV 

But  whence  does  this  complex  of  authority 
derive  itself  ?  Christ  is  declared  as  supreme,  as 
Divine,  but  how  is  that  conclusion  arrived  at  ? 
There  are  two  things  here  which  Leesing,  we 
believe,  amongst  modern  thinkers,  was  the  first 
to  draw  attention  to  —  the  consciousness  of  Christ 
Himself  and  the  consciousness  of  Hia 


about  Him  ;  —  His  own  faith  concerningjGrod  and  the 
universe,  and  the  faith  of  the  Church  in  Him. 
Here,  we  perceive,  are  twcTTorms  of  experience  : 
Christ's  own  immediate  experience  of  life  and  the 
world,  and  the  disciples'  own  experience  of  His 
personality.  For  the  knowledge  of  both  we  have 
to  go  to  the  New  Testament.  Between  Christ  and 
ourselves  stand  the  writers  of  this  record.  And 
now  we  come  upon  all  the  crucial  questions  raised 
at  once  by  philosophy  and  criticism  in  relation  to 
experience.  As  we  study  the  testimony  of  the 
Gospel  historians  we  are  compelled  to  carry  in  our 
minds  the  two  factors  of  experience  of  which  we 
spoke  at  the  beginning  —  namely,  the  outside  fact 
and  the  mind  which  observes  it. 

We  have  pointed  out  the  enormous  contribution 
made  by  the  perceiving  mind  to  what  we  call  our 
knowledge  of  the  outside  fact.  That  is  true  of 
all  minds.  What  is  now  in  addition  to  be  remem- 
bered is  the  relation  to  experience  of  the  quality 


1 0  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

and  training  of  the  perceiving  mind.  On  this 
depends  our  whole  modern  estimate  of  the  value  of 
evidence.  An  eclipse,  as  witnessed  by  a  savage 
and  by  an  astronomer,  is,  we  say,  in  itself  the  same 
event,  but  note  the  impression  of  it  on  these  two 
minds.  To  the  one  it  is  a  miracle  ;  to  the  other  it  is 
>_  the  verification  of  a  scientific  forecast.  The  one 
prostrates  himself  in  terror,  regarding  the  phenome- 
non as  manifesting  the  wrath  of  a  vengeful  Power. 
The  other  takes  photographs,  makes  rapid  observa- 
tions, scribbles  notes  which  are  to  be  the  bases  of 
future  calculations.  These  men  in  reporting  the 
occurrence  would  be  each  reporting  a  genuine  ex- 
perience of  the  same  fact.  But  what  a  difference 
in  the  mental  content  of  the  experience,  and  in  its 
value  as  evidence  for  us  !  As  compared  with  the 
report  of  the  scientist  that  of  the  savage  would  be 
of  no  value.  Its  only  interest  would  consist  in  the 
view  it  gave  of  what  passes,  under  such  circum- 
stances, in  a  rude,  untutored  mind.  It  is  worthless 
as  an  account  of  celestial  phenomena. 

But  why  is  the  one  testimony  of  so  much  more 
value  than  the  other  ?  For  answer  we  are  thrown 
back  on  the  history  of  experience,  a  chapter  fulj 
of  information  on  our  special  theme.  We  discover 
now  that  there  is  a  race-experience,  the  accumu- 
lation of  uncounted  millions  of  individual  ones. 
From  this  accumulation  has  been  born  in  the  minds 
of  successive  generations  a  race-consciousness 
which,  with  the  ages,  becomes  ever  richer  in  its 
contents  and  ever  surer  in  its  judgments.  Securus 
judicat  orbie  terrarum.  The  whole  human  race, 
as  Pascal  observed,  is  in  this  way  as  a  single  indi- 


INTRODUCTION  11 

vidual  ever  growing  and  ever  learning.  In  this 
common  consciousness  the  mistakes  of  individual 

""'^^•^^^Mi^***^^"*"***"'*  "~  '**^"*^W»^W««« 

observation  are  one  by  one  recognised  and  dropped. 
It  is  a  crucible  which  tries  everything  and  which, 
by  an  infallible  process,  rejects  the  dross  and 
retains  the  fine  gold.  The  race-consciousness, 
continually  testing  itself,  continually  adding  to  its 
treasures,  is  the  one  guide  we  possess,  the  guide 
whose  judgment  makes  the  nearest  approach  to 
infallibility  that  is  possible  to  humanity. 


We  have  now  to  ascertain  the  bearing  of  all  this 
upon  that  New  Testament  record  which,  as  we 
have  said,  stands  between  us  and  Christ.  As  with 
our  eclipse  so,  in  this  greater  appearance,  our 
first  question  is  with  the  witnesses.  What  facilities 
had  they  for  observing  Him  ;  with  what  eyes  did 
they  view  Him ;  what  inner  prepossessions  went  to 
the  total  make-up  of  their  impression  of  Him  ? 

Of  these  witnesses  let  us  begin  with  the  one  best 
known  to  us.  We  could  not  get  anywhere  a  better 
illustration  of  our  thesis  than  St.  Paul.  He  is  at 
once  authoritative  and  close  to  the  fact.  And  his 
Christianity  is  above  all  things^aT  Christianity  of 
experience,  founded  on  his  personal  consciousness. j 
His  career  was  moulded  by  what  he  believed  to 
have  been  an  immediate  contact  with  Jesus,  and 
he  directed  his  course,  and  built  up  his  theology 
— a  theology  destined  to  be  that  of  countless 
millions  to  follow — on  what  that  contact  brought  to 
him.  His  testimony,  moreover,  is  accepted  by 


12  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

critics  of  all  schools  as  that  of  a  perfectly  honest 
and  singularly  able  man.  His  guarantee  of  bona 
fides  is  that  he  gave  his  whole  life  as  a  pledge. 
What,  then,  was  Paul's  experience  of  Jesus,  and 
how  far  does  it  carry,  as  evidence  for  ourselves  ? 

From  his  own  letters,  and  from  the  story  in  the 
Acts  which  on  this  point  corroborates  them,  we 
learn  that  he  had  a  trance  or  vision  in  which  he 
believed  he  saw  the  crucified  Jesus,  and  which 
convinced  him  that  He,  whose  followers  he  was  then 
engaged  in  persecuting,  was  living  and  energising 
in  some  sphere  of  the  spiritual  world.  What  the 
physical  and  other  concomitants  of  this  vision 
were,  has  been,  in  late  years  especially,  the  subject 
of  many-sided  and  many-motived  investigation. 
It  is  noted  that  this  was  not  the  only  occurrence 
of  the  kind  that  the  Apostle  mentions.  He  was 
subject  to  visions  and  to  dreams,  to  which  he 
attached  a  crucial  importance.  And  this  has  led 
to  the  criticism  that  regards  these  experiences  as 
pathological  conditions,  which,  so  far  from  adding 
strength  to  his  religious  teaching,  detract  from  it. 
Paul  was,  in  this  view,  a  neurotic,  with  an  abnormal 
subconscious  activity.  He  had  trances  similar  to 
those  of  the  modern  medium.  His  vision  of  Christ 
was  a  piece  of  auto-suggestion,  the  result  of  long 
brooding  over  this  one  theme.  It  was  that  visuali- 
sation of  an  intensely  excited  subjective  condition 
with  which  scientific  hypnotists  are  familiar,  and  of 
which  they  can  furnish  us  with  innumerable  parallels. 

A  delightfully  easy  solution  this,  according  to 
which  Christianity,  traced  to  its  source,  resolves 
itself  into  an  affair  of  medicine.  A  jury  of  doctors 


INTRODUCTION  13 

have  held  inquest  upon  it  and  recorded  their  verdict 
in  terms  of  pathology  ! 

But   the   problem   is   not   quite   so   simple.     As 
to  what  lay  on  the  other  side  of  Paul's  vision  ; 
what  precisely  was  the  objective  fact  contained  in 
it,    we    are    not,    it    must    be    confessed,    in     a 
position   to   know.      We   are   here   on   the   hither 
side   of  Reality  and  must  accept  the  limitations 
of   the   position.      But   even   from   this   point   of 
view  we   see   some   things.     We   come   now   upon 
another   phase   of   our   philosophy   of   experience. 
Looking  at  the  two  elements  we  have  to  take  into 
account,  the  outside  fact  and  the  receptive  mind,   . 
we  observe  a  point  in  their  relation  which  makes  a 
decisive  factor  in  the  final  judgment.     It  is  that 
of  the  impression  made  by  the  fact  on  the  receiving 
mind  regarded  as  a  measure  of  its  external  cause. 
Our  experience   of   a   thunderstorm,   for  example, 
teaches  us  two  things.     Its  impression  on  us  is, 
for  one,  a  revelation  of  our  own  sensitiveness.   But 
it  reveals  also,  not  completely,  yet,  as  far  as  it 
goes,  with  entire  accuracy,  the  range  and  intensity 
of   the   storm  itself.     Could  we   give   scientifically  , 
the  entire  content  of  our  consciousness  while  under 
the  impression,  it  would  be  a  true  register  of  what 
was   happening   outside.     Let   us   now   apply   this 
to  what  we  have  immediately  in  hand,  the  Pauline 
experience  of  Christ. 

His  vision,  we  are  told,  is  on  a  line  with  that 
of  the  modern  medium.  Well,  we  know  our  modern 
medium,  his  trances  and  performances  in  general. 
We  have  full  details  of  the  experiments  in  hyp- 
notism, in  auto  and  other  suggestion,  made  of 


14  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

recent  years  in  America,  France,  and  England. 
In  reference  to  them  let  us  apply  that  gauge  of 
inner  response  we  have  just  been  examining.  What 
ie  the  response  element  in  our  medium  ?  We  find 
the  experiments  on  him  producing  no  faintest 
approximation  to  the  results  which  followed  in 
St.  Paul  from  the  experience  he  describes.  Stand- 
ing where  we  do,  and  trying  to  judge  the  business 
as  impartial  spectators,  our  task  is  to  measure  the 
quality  of  the  force  operating  on  the  Apostle's 
mind  by  the  effects  it  produced.  We  do  not  see 
the  force  or  its  origin  ;  we  are  not  sharers  in  his 
vision.  But  what  we  do  see  are  its  results.  And 
they  are  remarkable.  The  vision  transfigured  him. 
It  gave  him  a  new  view  of  the  world,  of  himself, 
of  Christ,  and  of  God.  And  the  power  under  which 
he  came  did  not  visit  him  as  a  solitary  impact,  but 
remained  throughout  his  life  as  an  abiding  influence. 
It  set  him  on  a  career  which  resulted  in  the  founding 
of  a  host  of  Christian  communities  in  Asia  and 
Europe.  It  rilled  him  with  an  ecstatic  emotion, 
with  an  adoring  love  for  Jesus  which  comes  out 
continually  in  his  letters  and  addresses.  It  formed 
the  groundwork  of  a  theology,  including  a  morality, 
which  has  lasted  nigh  two  thousand  years.  It  was 
the  starting-point  of  a  movement  which  has  per- 
meated the  modern  world  with  the  Christian  idea, 
and  which  is  running  with  unabated  force  to-day. 
These  results,  we  submit  to  our  medical  jury,  are 
not  those  which  we  see  flowing  from  the  medium- 
istic  trance  of  to-day  to  which  they  point  us.  The 
explanation  of  the  Pauline  experience  must,  at 
any  rate,  go  deeper  than  that. 


INTRODUCTION  15 

VI 

Let  us  in  search  of  it  come  back  to  Paul  himself. 
In  studying  what  he  has  to  say,  we  are  driven  at 
once  to  a  constructive,  and  also  to  a-  critical 
attitude.  He  offers  us  material  of  a  most 
remarkable  kind,  and  which  we  have,  before 
using  it  in  our  building,  to  sift  with  the  utmost 
care.  On  the  strength  of  his  experience  he  has 
reared,  as  we  have  said,  a  theologv  of  imposing 
dimensions.  In  this  system  he  gives  to  Jesus 
a  cosmic  position  as  the  Son  of  God,  who 
died'  as  a  ransom  for  sinful  men,  who  will  be 
their  future  Judge,  who  is  now  the  Head  of  the 
Church,  ever  present  with  it,  though  invisible, 
working  in  and  through  its  members  as  surely 
as  He  wrought  upon  the  Apostle  himself,  though, 
maybe,  in  less  definite  ways.  In  this  theology  he 
speaks  with  equal  confidence  of  a^  invisibl 


and  a  future  state,  of  heaven,  ol  angels,  of  evil 
spirits,  of  Satan,  of  a  speedy  second  coming  of 
Christ  and  end  of  the  world. 

How  much,  we  ask  again,  does  this  theology 
teach  us  as  to  the  actual  reality  ?  There  was,  we 
have  argued,  a  great  spiritual  force  behind  the 
Apostle's  visions.  But  how  far  does  this  go  as 
guaranteeing  the  accuracy  of  the  Pauline  views  ? 
Employing  again  our  philosophy  of  experience,  we 
must  examine  now  in  Paul's  case  the  mind  and  its 
furniture  on  which  the  outside  fact  operated.  We 
have  noted  the  difference  between  the  Hottentot 
and  the  astronomer  as  recipients  of  impressions. 
Where  does  the  Apostle  stand  as  a  recipient  ? 


16  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Here  we  have  to  make  some  serious 'admissions. 
St.  Paul  does  not  observe  his  fact  as  our  astronomer 
would  observe  his.  He  was  not,  in  our  sense, 
scientific.  He  was  a  child  of  his  time  and  race, 
and  shared  its  limitations.  He  had  the  mental 
consciousness  of  the  Jew  of  nineteen  centuries 
ago,  and  what  is  evident  is  that  his  new  spiritual 
experience,  whatever  its  value,  in  no  degree  disin- 
herited him  of  that  consciousness.  No  one,  indeed, 
who  knows  anything  of  the  history  of  human 
development  would  expect  any  such  result.  The 
world's  spiritual  education  does  not  proceed  that 
way.  For  its  purposes  men  are  taken  as  they  are. 
They  are  not  first  stripped  of  their  skin. 

St.  Paul,  then,  we  have  to  recognise,  brings  to  his 
fact  his  own  peculiar  way  of  looking  at  it.  It  is 
in  many  respects  very  different  from  our  way. 
As  we  make  an  inventory  of  his  mental  interior  we 
find  in  it  some  strange  enough  furniture;  strange, 
that  is,  to  the  intellectual  habits  of  our  century, 
though  not  strange  at  all  to  students  of  the  litera- 
ture of  his  nation  and  period.  His  view,  for 
instance,  of  the  approaching  end  of  the  world 
was  that  of  the  Jewish  Apocalypses  of  the  time. 
His  to  us  singular  reason  for  the  covering  of  women's 
heads  in  church,  given  in  I.  Cor.  xi.  10,  is  derived 
from  the  Rabbinic  view  that  evil  spirits  hovered 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  women,  seeking  to  gain 
advantage  over  them.  Entirely  Oriental  also  is 
his  conception,  in  the  same  chapter,  of  God  as  being 
(in  the  form  of  a  man  rather  than  of  a  woman. 
Heaven  is  to  him,  as  to  his  Jewish  contemporaries, 
a  succession  of  spheres  overarching  the  earth, 


INTRODUCTION  17 

arranged  in  ascending  grades  of  superiority.  His 
notions  of  original  sin  and  of  the  Fall  were  also 
the  current  ideas  of  the  time.  In  the  fourth  book 
of  Ezra,  with  which  he  was  assuredly  familiar,  we 
read  :  "  By  reason  of  his  evil  heart  the  first  Adam 
fell  into  sin  and  guilt,  and  also  all  who  came  after 
him."  And  in  Ecclesiasticus  we  have  the  state- 
ment :  "  From  a  woman  was  the  beginning  of 
sin,  and  therefore  of  her  we  all  die." 

When,  moreover,  we  come  to  Paul's  Curistology 
we  have  again  to  examine  the  kind  of  ground  on 
which  his  experience  of  Jesus  actually  fell.  We 
are  in  no  position  for  understanding  or  properly 
valuing  his  language  here  unless  we  know  how 
that  language  came  to  him.  When,  for  instance,  he 
speaks  of  Jesus  as  the  "  Son  of  God,"  "  the  Lord," 
the  "  image  of  God,"  and  so  on,  the  instinct  of  the 
pious  reader,  nourished  on  the  old  traditions,  is 
to  take  these  expressions  as  coined  under  a  direct 
inspiration,  affirming  with  a  Divine  precision  the 
place  of  Jesus  in  the  cosmic  scheme.  But,  as 
modern  scholarship  compels  us  now  to  recognise, 
this  is  too  na'ive  a  suggestion.  The  Apostle  expresses 
himself  here  in  terms  that  were  already  made  for 
him,  in  thought-forms  familiar  to  his  contem- 
poraries. The  Messianic  idea  which  possessed  the 
mind  of  the  later  Judaism  had  in  Paul's  time 
developed  into  a  full-grown  conception  of  a  Divine- 
human  Mediator,  God's  image  and  representative 
to  man.  Philo  of  Alexandria,  a  contemporary  of 
Jesus,  with  whose  writings  the  Apostle  may  have 
been  acquainted,  is  full  of  this  idea.  Thus,  in  his 
'''  De  Monarchia,"  he  says  :  "  The  Word  by  which 

2 


18 

the  world  was  made  is  the  Image  of  the  Supreme 
Deity."  He  speaks  also  of  the  Logos  as  "  His  First- 
Begotten  Son,"  and  as  "  An  Intercessor  between  the 
Creator  and  the  created."  "  God,"  he  says  further, 
"  has  appointed  a  Prince  and  Ransom  for  the  soul." 
The  Intercessor  is  also  "  The  Image  of  God  and 
First-Born  of  all  intelligent  creatures."  On  the 
office  of  the  Mediator  he  observes  :  "  It  is  necessary 
for  a  person  performing  his  duty  to  the  All  Father  to 
apply  to  His  Son  as  to  an  Advocate,  the  most 
perfect  in  every  virtue,  both  to  have  his  sins  forgiven 
and  also  for  the  obtaining  of  every  good  gift." 
This  Jine_^f^thought  was,  in  fact,  in  the  air  ;  it  was 
the  ^entaljcnode^  of  the  time.  It  is  impossible 
for  us  to  study  this  literature  and  not  to  recognise 
'  its  vital  relationship  to  the  expressions  about  Christ 
used  by  St.  Paul  and  the  other  New  Testament 
'writers.  As  a  recent  critic,  Professor  Wernle,  puts 
it  :  "  They  experienced  something  abnormal  in 
Jesus,  but  in  order  to  express  it  their  own  words 
fail  them.  So  they  turn  to  the  Jewish  categories 
nearest  at  hand  and  attempt  to  confine  the  inde- 
finable within  these  definitions." 


VII 

Our  inquiry,  so  far  as  it  has  gone,  gives  us,  then, 
a  witness  entirely  sincere,  who  has  had  a  spiritual 
experience  of  the  greatest  kind,  but  who,  in  his 
report  of  it,  uses  the  language  of  his  time,  and 
accompanies  the  report  with  ideas  which  express 
his  mental  limitations.  Let  us  carry  the  investiga- 
tion a  point  further.  In  St.  Paul's  testimony  of 


INTRODUCTION  19 

Christ  one  of  the  leading  features  is  the  account  he 
gives  of  His  death.  The  Pauline  theology  may  be 
said,  in  fact,  to  centre  in  the  cross.  In  studying  his 
letters  one  might  suppose  that  he  was  ignorant  of 
the  details  of  Christ's  career,  or  that  he  regarded 
them  as  unimportant.  His  whole  teaching  concen- 
trates itself  upon  Christ  as  the  crucified,  as  having 
risen  again  and  entered  into  the  spiritual  world, 
and  on  the  relations  of  all  this  to  the  problems  of 
sin  and  salvation.  Here,  again,  in  asking  ourselves 
as  to  the  validity  for  us  of  this  testimony,  we  are 
thrown  back  on  Paul's  personal  experience  in  these 
matters  and  on  the  question  as  to  what  precisely 
it  was  worth.  How  was  it  that  the  death  of  Jesus 
so  affected  him  ;  that  he  saw  it  in  this  light ;  that  | 
he  came  to  build  this  theology  upon  it  ?  He  had 
not  been  a  witness  of  the  event  himself.  To  him, 
as  to  us,  it  was  in  itself  a  bare  fact  in  history. 

From  whatever  standpoint  we  regard  the  Cruci^ 
fixion  it  remains  as  the  miracle  of  miracles  that,^ 
occurring  as  it  did,  it  should  have  produced  the/ 
effect  it  did.  The  amazing  feature  of  it  is  that,) 
accepted  by  all  the  Churches  as  the  basis  of  their 
theology,  the  participators  in  the  tragedy,  the 
witnesses  of  it,  including  the  disciples  themselves, 
never  suspected  there  was  any  theology  in  it  at  all ! 
All  these  people,  Annas  and  Caiaphas,  Pilate,  the 
Scribes  and  Pharisees  who  had  assisted  at  the  trial, 
down  to  the  Roman  soldiers  and  the  Jerusalem 
mob  who  enjoyed  themselves  at  the  spectacle,  had, 
indeed,  their  own  theology,  but  they  saw  none  of 
it  here.  They  believed  most  of  them  in  a  Deity 
who  could  be  propitiated  by  sacrifices.  But  here 


20          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

was  no  offering  to  Deity.  Jesus  was  simply  a 
prisoner  condemned  by  the  authorities.  It  never 
occurred  to  them  that  His  death  was  a  sacrifice ; 
it  was  an  execution. 

How,  then,  was  the  miracle  wrought  ?  How 
came  it  that  this  bloody  death,  in  the  mind  of 
the  Apostle  and  of  the  early  Christians,  assumed 
the  significance  which  they  gave  to  it  ?  We  must 
seek  the  answer  in  a  fresh  examination  of  the  mental 
ground  on  which  the  great  fact  fell.  In  studying 
the  Apostle's  mind  here  the  key  to  its  workings 
on  this  theme  is  found  in  the  fact  that  he  was  a 
Jew.  He  had  been  brought  up  in  a  religion  of 
sacrifices,  of  propitiatory  offerings.  The  temple 
at  Jerusalem  was  standing  during  his  lifetime  and 
its  altars  daily  reeked  with  the  blood  of  victims. 
His  mind,  like  that  of  his  contemporaries,  was  full 
of  these  early-world  conceptions,  and  they  were 
bound  to  give  their  own  colour  to  any  new  factors 
that  entered  his  consciousness.  When,  then,  the 
great  experience  came  to  him  on  the  Damascus 
road,  an  experience  which  assured  him  that  the 
Crucified  lived  and  was  potent  in  the  spiritual 
world,  his  interpretation  was  bound  to  follow  the 
line  which  his  mental  training  opened. 

In  dwelling  on  this  theme  his  thought  took  one  of 
those  forward  leaps  which  mark  the  great  stages  in 
the  world's  spiritual  evolution.  In  this  one  mind  an 
age's  accumulation  of  human  experiences  had  flashed 
ipto  a  new  synthesis.  Jesus  had  died  under  the 
law,  a  victim  to  Judaism,  to  that  system  whose 
animal  sacrifices,  ritual  requirements,  and  dull  round 
of  observances  had  already  filled  this  eager  soul 


INTRODUCTION  21 

with  such  a  sense  of  futility  and  of  spiritual  barren 
ness.  And  it  now  came  to  him  that  Jesus,  the  victim 
of  this  system,  had  at  the  same  time  conquered  it. 
His  suffering  had  carried  the  whole  conception 
of  law,  of  penalty,  of  sacrifice  into  a  new  plane. 
Evolution,  as  a  formulated  doctrine,  was  as  yet 
ages  before  its  time,  but  what  passed  in  the  apostle's 
mind  here  was  an  inspiration  that  followed  the 
true  line  of  evolution.  In  the  ascent  of  life,  which 
the  doctrine  of  development  teaches,  the  higher 
form  that  has  just  emerged  contains  all  the  lower 
forms  in  a  transfigured  way.  It  was  this  trans- 
figuration of  the  lower  idea  of  sacrifice  contained 
in  Judaism  which  Paul  now  saw  in  the  death  of 
Christ.  It  is  impossible  for  us  to  enter  fully  into 
the  apostle's  feeling  here,  because  we  have  not  had 
his  foregoing  experience  of  Judaism.  For  a  parallel 
we  have  to  go  to  Luther  and  the  Reformation. 
We  are  quite  unable  to  understand  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  first  reformers  for  the  doctrine  of  justification 
by  faith  until  we  have  realised  the  yoke  of  heavy 
and  utterly  futile  observances  from  which  it  was  a 
deliverance.  The  same  may  be  said  of  St.  Paul? 
and  his  doctrine  of  the  Cross. 

Paul  delights  himself  henceforth  in  pouring  out 
in  his  letters  and  addresses  his  hoarded  Jewish  lore,  ' 
and  to  show  in'Christianity  its  glorious  new  applica- 
tion. He  has  reached  the  upper  side  of  that  sacri- 
ficial system  which  before  had  so  plagued  him. 
Much  of  the  lore  which  serves  this  new  office  was, 
it  is  true,  pure  Rabbinism,  touched  with  the  defects 
of  the  system.  At  some  of  his  expositions  we 
are  inclined  to  smile,  and  the  world- view  in  which 


22         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

he  places  his  thought  has  been  largely  superseded. 
Not  the  less  is  the  position  which  he  takes  on  the 
death  of  Christ  a  revelation.      It  is  so  in  the  true 
scientific  meaning  of  that  term.     For  it  was  the 
dawn  in  his  spirit,  at  the  appointed  time,  of  a  new 
truth  in  the  sphere  of  religion  ;  a  fresh  step  in  the 
ascent  of  life  on  its  inner  side.     As  much  as  the 
emergence  of  man  from  the  anthropoid  apes  marked 
/a  step  upwards  in  the  scale  of  being,  so  did  this 
conception  of  the  dying  Jesus,  as  the  ultimate  and 
eternal  sacrifice,  the  consecration  for  ever  of  the 
LL*-j  •  principle  of  sacrifice — as  a  love-offering  and  a  love- 
suffering  in  the  service  of  the  world — mark  a  stage 
,    forward  in  the  spiritual  evolution, 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  pronounce  with  some 
degree  of  clearness  upon  this  whole  Pauline  experi- 
ence, regarded  as  evidence  for  ourselves.  It  amounts, 
we  perceive,  in  relation  to  the  personality  of  Jesus 
to  something  much  less  rigidly  defined,  to  something 
vastly  more  human,  vastly  closer  to  life  as  we 
know  it,  than  the  theological  formularies  have 
made  out.  We  understand  a  good  deal  better  the 
significance  of  the  titles  and  ascriptions  Paul  applies 
to  Christ  when  we  see  how  he  came  by  them.  He 
has,  we  find,  translated  here  the  immense  impression 
made  on  him  by  his  personal  experience  of  Jesus 
in  phrases  current  at  the  time.  But  the  inquiry 
which  yields  these  results  in  no  degree  invalidates 
his  testimony  as  to  the  uniqueness  of  Christ,  and 
His  claim  to  love  and  devotion.  Jesus  is  not  the 
less  divinely  inspiring  for  us  that  we  find  our- 
selves less  able  than  before  to  draw  His  boundary 
lines. 


I  INTRODUCTION  23 

VIII 

Thus  much  of  the  Pauline  experience.  We  have 
next  to  note  its  relation  to  what  else  is  given  us  in 
the  New  Testament.  Paul's  picture  of  Jesus 
is  stamped  everywhere  with  the  character  of  his 
own  personality.-  But  in  the  main  points  it  is 
marvellously  in  accord  with  what  else  we  find  in  the 
record.  The  Gospels,  like  the  Epistles,  are  the 
reflection  of  an  experience.  And  the  reflection 
again  is  shaped  largely  by  the  quality  of  the  mirror. 
The  informants  who  offer  to  us  the  facts  of  Christ's 
life  are  here  also  unscientific  observers.  They  carry 
in  their  eye  a  world  of  things  which  stood  between 
them  and  the  bare  fact.  Signs  and  wonders  pour 
into  their  narratives  because  their  minds,  like  those 
of  their  contemporaries,  are  a  wonder-factory. 
They  have  no  such  sense  of  the  uniformity  of  nature 
as  fills  the  modern  chronicler.  Their  mental  con- 
dition is  nearer  that  of  the  good  Chinese  Buddhist, 
Hiouen  Thsang,  who,  in  his  journey  to  India, 
records  of  Buddha's  footprint  that  "  it  seems  of 
more  or  less  size  according  to  the  greater  or  less 
faith  of  the  beholder." 

In  studying  these  records,  too,  we  have  to  remem- 
ber that  the  earliest  of  them  was  put  together,  in 
the  form  we  have  it,  more  than  a  generation  after 
the  death  of  Jesus.  That,  as  history  shows  us, 
was  a  period  long  enough  for  a  certain  development 
of  myth  and  legend.  To  take  a  parallel  instance, 
that  of  the  extant  biographies  of  Francis  of  Assisi. 
The  accounts  of  his  contemporaries,  such  as  the 
Speculum  Perfectionis  of  Frater  £eo,  contain  some 


24          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

things  sufficiently  astonishing.  But  in  the  genera- 
tion immediately  following,  imagination  had  given 
itself  fuller  scope.  The  Life  of  Francis  by  Bona- 
ventura,  written  at  an  interval  not  greater  than  that 
between  the  death  of  Jesus  and  the  publication 
of  Mark's  Gospel,  is  stuffed  with  the  incredible. 
A  yet  more  striking  illustration,  because  so  much 
nearer  our  own  time,  is  that  afforded  by  the  story 
of  the  Babist  sect  of  Persia.  The  Bab  was  Ali 
Mohammed,  a  seer  of  Shiraz,  who  was  regarded 
by  his  followers  as  a  kind  of  Mohammedan  Messiah. 
He  was  put  to  death  by  the  Persian  authorities 
in  1850,  at  the  age  of  thirty.  The  first  account 
of  him,  a  contemporary  one,  was  written  by  Merza 
Jani,  who  was  himself  executed  in  1852.  Then 
came  another  "  Life,"  a  generation  later,  in  1880 
that  is,  by  two  disciples.  When  we  compare  this 
new  history  with  the  earlier  one,  we  have  an  illus- 
tration made  under  our  very  eyes  of  the  natural 
history  of  legend  in  an  Eastern  country.  This 
last  account  is  full  of  miracles.  There  is,  for  instance, 
a  narrative  of  the  seer's  transfiguration  in  1846  on 
a  ride  from  Shiraz  to  Teheran.  And  yet  this 
"  history  "  was  written  within  the  lifetime  of  the 
prophet's  widow. 

Considerations  of  this  kind  are  such  as  the 
modern  inquirer  finds  it  impossible  to  ignore  in 
studying  the  Gospel  records.  Christ  as  a  reality 
is  the  fact  he  wants  to  get  at.  In  his  quest  he 
comes  upon  these  reflections  of  Him,  and  he  is 
bound  to  ask  himself  how  much  belongs  to  the 
objective  fact,  and  how  much  to  the  mirror  itself  ? 

We   have   nothing   direct   from   Christ   Himself. 


INTRODUCTION  25 

He  was  not  a  writer  of  books  or  even  of  letters. 
With  the  exception  of  the  doubtful  epistle  to  the 
King  of  Edessa,  there  is  no  published  thing  from 
His  hand.  We  do  not  even  know  what  He  was 
like.  The  race  He  belonged  to  had  no  taste  for 
the  arts,  and  so,  while  we  are  familiar  with 
the  features  of  Rameses  and  of  Caesar,  we  have 
no  authentic  statue  or  picture  of  Christ.  The 
early  fathers  who  venture  descriptions  of  His 
personal  appearance  are  evidently  drawing  on 
their  imagination.  They  are  hopelessly  con- 
tradictory. Christ  left  no  material  trace  of  Himself 
on  His  native  land.  Sir  Christopher  Wren  is,  as  it 
were,  visible  to  us  in  his  great  stone  mountain  on 
Ludgate  Hill.  The  dome  of  St.  Peter's,  the  frescoes 
of  the  Sistine  Chapel  are  the  perpetual  reminders  of  •' 
Michel  Angelo.  The  Egyptian  kings  live  on  in 
their  pyramids.  But  Jesus  left  no  trace.  He- 
built  nothing.  The  traveller  in  Palestine  finds  a 
stony  wilderness,  a  country  at  the  farthest  rear  of 
civilisation,  in  the  grasp  of  an  alien  faith. 

What,  then,  to-day  do  we  actually  possess  on 
which  to  found  our  knowledge  of  Jesus  ?  After 
the  survey  we  have  been  making  of  the  ground  ; 
after  recognising  the  various  elements  which  enter 
into  experience  and  their  differing  value ;  after 
allowing  for  the  mental  limitations  of  the  writers 
of  our  Gospels  ;  after  accepting  the  possible  intro- 
duction into  their  narratives  of  myth  and  legend, 
what  of  actuality  remains  ?  Has  Christ  under  this 
process  ceased  to  be  for  us  a  reality  ?  Or,  admitted 
as  historic,  does  He  sink  to  a  position  inferior  to 
that  which  the  Church  has  hitherto  assigned  Him  T 


26  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

We  see  no  likelihood  of  any  such  eclipse.  For 
the  philosophy  of  experience,  which  compels  us 
to  such  seeming  severities  on  the  negative  side,  is 
not  less  decisive  on  its  affirmative.  We  have  already 
spoken  of  the  element  of  response  as  a  criterion 
of  truth.  Our  register  of  an  outside  fact  is  the 
feeling  it  excites  in  us.  Whether  the  outside  fact 
be  a  thunderstorm  or  an  historic  personage,  the 
truth  about  them  is  wrapped  up  in  the  consciousness 
they  produce  in  us,  if  only  we  can  accurately 
analyse  that  consciousness.  We  have,  indeed,  no 
other  way.  of  getting  at  our  fact.  With  this  in 
mind,  as  we  study  our  New  Testament,  we  realise 
Jesus  as  not  so  much  in  it  as  behind  it.  When 
Vesuvius  hurls  its  million  tons  of  material  into  the 
air,  what  holds  us  as  we  view  the  spectacle  is  not 
so  much  the  visible  phenomenon  as  the  thought 
of  the  force  beneath.  In  studying  the  Gospels  and 
Epistles  we  have  a  similar  feeling.  What,  we  ask,  is 
the  power  that  produced  all  this  ?  For  when  all 
the  exaggerations  have  been  discounted  there 
remains  one  element  here  whose  accuracy  cannot 
be  questioned.  It  is  the  element  of  response.  The 
book  throughout  is  the  expression  of  an  immense 
emotion,  which  we  have  to  explain.  When  we 
have  finished  our  analysis  of  the  language  and 
thought-forms  in  which  the  evangelists  describe 
Jesus  it  still  remains  that  this  is  the  language 
which  expressed  their  feeling ;  which  expressed 
the  love,  the  wonder,  the  awe  with  which  His  per- 
sonality filled  them.  What  we  cannot  doubt  is 
that  they  are  trying  here  to  offer  us  a  sense  of  a 
great  and  wondrous  mystery  that  had  come  into 


INTRODUCTION  27 

fv 

their  lives.  The  One  they  write  about  had  made 
on  them  the  impression  of  something  great,  pure, 
celestially  beautiful,  that  had  opened  new  horizons 
to  the  soul.  But  by  the  dynamic  law  we  are  con- 
sidering it  follows  that  the  impression  on  their 
side  argued  a  corresponding  power  on  the  other. 
From  the  study  of  the  New  Testament,  considered 
as  a  recital  of  experience,  we  are  led  irresistibly  to 
the  conception  of  a  spiritual  force  behind  it  which 
it  is  no  abuse  of  language  to  call  Divine. 

IX 

It  has  been  the  misfortune  of  theology  that  age 
after  age  it  has  been  so  eagerly  engaged  in  mapping 
out  the  limits  and  boundaries  of  the  Divine  element 
in  Jesus.  In  the  process  theology  has  injured  its 
eyesight,  like  observers  who  gaze  too  fixedly  on 
the  sun.  The  usefulness  of  the  sun  is  disclosed  to 
us  not  by  looking  at  it  but  by  working  in  its  light. 
The  original  Christianity,  that  which  lived  in  the 
bosom  of  Jesus,  which  consisted  of  His  own  direct 
experience  of  God,  life  and  the  world,  is  like  the 
solar  centre,  hidden  from  us.  We  know  it  only 
by  the  burning  heat  which  has  radiated  from  it. 
Men  will  easily  accept  the  Incarnation  if  only  we  will 
refrain  from  definitions  of  it.  When  Beyschlag 
declares  for  the  purely  human  consciousness  of 
Jesus ;  when  Bitschl  finds  here  "  the  religious 
value  of  God,"  God,  that  is,  revealed  along  the 
lines  of  spirit,  will  and  love  ;  when  Theodore  of 
Mopsuestia,  one  of  the  sanest  minds  in  the  whole 
catalogue  of  the  Fathers,  sees  *'  the  human  spirit  of 


28  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Jesus  so  perfectly  appropriating  the  Divine  as  to 
become  entirely  one  with  it " ;  we  recognise  the 
honesty,  and  in  a  certain  degree  the  value  of  these 
appraisements. 

Not  the  less  do  they  make  us  realise  that  the 
religion  of  experience  gains  little  from  these  defi- 
nitions. We  know  Christ's  nature  best  by  the 
?  response  it  has  created  in  others.  And  here  we 
come  upon  a  great  extension  of  our  theme.  For  our 
knowledge  of  Christ  as  a  knowledge  mediated 
through  human  hearts  does  not  end  in  the  New 
Testament  records.  It  emerges  from  them  into 
the  vaster  sphere  of  the  world  and  of  the  ages. 
And  this  region  we  find  to  be  one  not  only  so  much 
wider  than  the  first  but  where  we  find  ourselves  on 
so  much  surer  ground.  It  is  not  here  a  question 
of  historical  detail,  where  it  is  so  easy  to  be  mis- 
taken, but  of  those  psychological  facts,  those 
contents  of  the  human  consciousness  which  come 
nearest  of  all  to  our  conception  of  reality.  We 
deal  here  not  with  the  accidents  of  time  and  place 5 
but  with  the  working  of  the  inner  laws,  with  the 
impact  of  spiritual  forces  on  the  soul. 
/  What  are  the  facts  here  ?  As  we  survey  the 
course  of  history  in  the  centuries  that  have  followed 
the  Christian  beginnings,  we  find  ourselves  every- 
where in  the  presence  of  a  new  world-power.  We 
have  to  study  here  the  significance  of  Jesus  not 
simply  as  He  is  given  us  in  the  Gospels,  but  as  we 
find  Him  wrought  into  the  warp  and  woof  of  innu- 
merable saintly  souls.  We  have  the  Christ  actual- 
ised  in  a  Perpetua,  an  Augustine,  a  Bernard,  a 
lif,  a  Fletcher  of  Madeley,  a  Chalmers  of  New 


INTRODUCTION  29 

Guinea.  The  Bollandist  collection  of  "  Lives  of  the 
Saints  "  fills  fifty-five  volumes  and  deals  with  twenty- 
five  thousand  lives.  But  these  are  the  merest 
fraction  of  the  whole.  One  of  the  surest  things 
we  know  is  that  during  these  last  twenty  centuries 
there  has  been  rolling  over  the  world  a  stream 
of  spiritual  life,  which  has  flowed  in  upon  generation 
after  generation  of  men,  producing  in  them,  amid 
all  varieties  of  temperament,  education  and  en- 
vironment, a  certain  moral  result.  '  It  has  been 
a  result  of  inner  quickening,  of  a  new  refinement 
of  feeling,  of  philanthropic  passion,  of  an  ardour 
of  self-sacrificing  love  for  the  unfortunate  and  the 
outcast.  There  is  no  doubt  about  these  facts, 
and  the  question  is  as  to  their  explanation.  There 
are  no  effects  without  causes.  The  stream  does 
not  rise  above  its  source.  Is  there  any  explanation 
which  better  fits  all  the  facts  than  that  which 
St.  Paul  and  the  New  Testament  everywhere  give, 
of  a  Power  behind  the  scenes,  personal,  related  to 
humanity,  yet  spiritual  and  immortal  ? 


Let  us  consider  these  last  terms  for  a  moment. 
Christianity  is  the  religion  of  a  human  life  and 
death,  with  the  sequel  of  the  invisible  action  of  a 
vast  post-mortem  power.  This  power  was  in  its 
operation  moral  and  spiritual.  But  morality  and 
spirituality  are  qualities  of  persons.  They  sup- 
pose personality  and  are  inconceivable  without 
it.  It  is  time  we  gave  up  being  afraid  of  this 
term  in  a  cosmic  connection,  as  though  it  were 


30          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

unscientific.  The  cry  of  "  anthropomorphism  "  as 
applied  to  an  unseen  personality  is  surely  by  this 
time  out  of  date.  When  we  are  told  that  this  is  a 
mere  projection  of  ourselves  into  the  sphere  of 
causes,  we  reply  that  there  is  no  theory  of  the 
universe  possible  to  us  which  does  not  lie  open  to 
the  same  criticism.  If  we  adopt  the  barest  material- 
ism and  speak  only  of  matter  and  force,  we  are  still 
entirely  anthropomorphic.  For  the  idea  of  force, 
as  much  as  the  idea  of  will  or  of  intelligence,  is 
derived  entirely  from  our  own  consciousness. 
Why,  we  repeat,  should  we  be  afraid  of  personality 
in  our  conception  of  the  world-process  ?  So  far 
as  we  can  see,  personality  is  the  beginning  and  the 
end  of  things.  It  is  the  one  thing  towards  which 
nature  incessantly  strives.  It  is  the  one  interesting 
thing.  As  Bradley,  in  his  "  Appearance  and 
Reality,"  puts  it :  "  Outside  of  spirit  there  is  not, 
and  there  cannot  be,  any  reality  ;  and  the  more 
anything  is  spiritual  so  much  the  more  is  it  veritably 
real."  There  could  be  no  use  in  a  universe  which 
did  not  know  itself.  The  seas,  the  mountains,  the 
cosmic  forces,  time,  eternity,  are  significant  only  to 
an  eye  that  sees,  to  an  intelligence  that  understands. 
The  New  Testament  writers,  then,  in  ascribing 
personality  to  the  power  which  influenced  them, 
were  so  far  assuredly  within  the  limits  of  sound 
thinking.  Their  further  assurance  that  this  personal 
power  was  that  of  their  Master,  who  had  survived 
death  and  was  operating  on  them  from  some  invisible 
sphere,  is,  of  course,  more  positive,  and  open  to 
criticism  of  another  kind.  But  there  is  no  a  priori 
impossibility.  What  we  know  of  life,  still  more 


INTRODUCTION  31 

what  we  do  not  know,  makes  it  absurd  to  place 
this  supposition  among  the  inconceivables.  The 
survival  of  personality,  in  its  commonest  forms, 
is  to-day  being  made  the  subject  of  a  scientific 
investigation  which  is  accumulating  a  vast  and 
ever-increasing  body  of  evidence.  Men  are  ceasing 
to  deny  post-mortem  influences.  They  are,  instead, 
constructing  a  philosophy  of  them.  When,  to  this 
general  impression,  we  add,  as  evidence  of  the 
continued  and  exalted  life  of  Jesus,  the  whole  body 
of  experiences  we  have  here  been  considering,  the 
entire  result  of  it,  upon  some  of  us  at  least,  is  one 
which  no  criticism  of  details,  no  argument  from 
the  mental  limitations  of  the  recipients  can  weaken, 
far  less  destroy. 

Thus  far,  then,  does  experience  seem  to  carry 
us  as  a  witness  of  religion,  and  of  Christianity  as 
its  highest  expression.  We  can  see  now  what  it 
has,  and  what  it  has  not,  procured  us.  The  New 
Testament  is  a  record  of  human  experiences.  In 
them,  in  their  character  and  intensity,  we  have 
to  seek  our  register  of  the  forces  that  lie  behind. 
They  offer  us  no  cut-and-dried  theory  of  the  Infinite, 
nor  of  its  relation  to  the  finite.  The  word  "  Trinity," 
which  Tertullian  introduced  to  Christian  theology, 
was,  like  some  other  of  his  contributions,  a  very 
doubtful  asset  to  the  Church.  We  are  better 
without  it ;  better,  for  our  knowledge  of  this  theme, 
with  the  primitive  emotions  of  Evangelists  and 
Apostles,  and  with  the  phrases  in  which  they  seek 
to  express  them.  Placed  as  we  are  in  the  scale 
of  being,  we  look  through  too  small  an  aperture  to 
be  able  to  take  in  the  scheme  as  a  whole.  We  do 


32          RELIGION  AND   EXPERIENCE 

not  know  the  absolute  as  such.  Our  knowledge  is 
relative.  We  do  not  know  how  personality  is 
related  to  the  ultimate  Real.  All  we  know  is  that 
it  is  there.  As  the  blue  heaven  above  us  yields  its 
cloud,  born  of  itself,  and  by-and-by  to  be  re- 
absorbed  into  its  infinitude,  so  does  the  Abyss  of 
Being,  in  whom  all  things  are,  yield  its  personality, 
filled  and  penetrated  with  its  own  essence.  The  All, 
to  be  the  All,  must  contain  personality.  It  must 
express  itself  by  personality.  That  is  as  far  as  we 
can  see  on  the  upper  side. 

On  the  lower,  that  of  history,  we  have  the  records 
we  have  been  trying  to  analyse.  We  have  Jesus, 
living  His  life  in  Galilee,  dying  at  Jerusalem,  and 
leaving  on  His  disciples  the  impressions  we  have 
discussed.  After  that  we  have  further  experiences, 
the  first-hand  testimony  of  St.  Paul,  and  that  other 
evidence,  accumulating  through  the  following 
centuries,  of  spiritual  energies  operating  on 
innumerable  souls.  As  to  these  energies  there 
is  no  question.  Their  uplift  is  realised  every 
day  by  Christian  men.  In  yielding  themselves 
joyously  to  these  powers ;  in  carrying  out,  with 
their  reinforcement,  the  laws  of  love,  of  service, 
and  of  sacrifice  ;  in  projecting  their  thought  and 
hope  onward  to  a  future  life,  where  their  being 
will  find  completion  ;  in  a  word,  in  holding  on  to 
the  essence  of  New  Testament  religion  they  know 
themselves  on  sure  ground.  And  that  in  face  of 
all  that  modern  science  and  philosophy  have  to  say. 
For  along  every  inch  of  the  way  the  ground  is  that 
not  of  abstract  theories  or  a  priori  speculation,  but  of 
the  evidence  which  alone  convincingly  appeals  to 


INTRODUCTION  33 

us,  the  evidence  of  the  actual  impressions  of  the 
mind  in  contact  with  outside  facts.  When  we  have 
sifted  these  impressions,  weighed  them  in  the  scales 
of  the  modern  world-consciousness,  corrected  them 
by  our  latest  and  surest  apparatus  of  science  and 
criticism,  we  have  on  the  religious  side  the  nearest 
approach  to  ultimate  truth  that  in  this  world  is 
open  to  us.  It  is  on  this  ground  the  instructed 
Christian  of  to-day  claims  to  stand.  His  religion 
becomes  thus,  in  the  best  sense,  a  religion  of 
experience. 


Having  examined  in  this  way  the  findings  of 
experience  in  Christianity  considered  as  a  whole,  we 
shall  now,  in  succeeding  chapters,  endeavour  to 
discover  what  experience  has  to  say  in  the  applica- 
tion of  the  Christian  idea  to  some  of  the  problems 
of  modern  life. 


I 

Our  New  Senses 

THE  best  proof  of  evolution  is  the  fact  that  we  are 
evolving.  The  work  is  going  on  before  our  eyes. 
The  thing  that  was  not  is  there  visibly  coming  into 
being.  In  human  nature  and  human  history  we 
perceive  the  slow  emergence  of  new  forms  of  power, 
glimmerings  of  vast  possibilities  yet  to  be  realised. 
Man  is  in  the  making,  the  greatest  part  of  him  still 
to  come.  Behind  is  the  boundless,  inexhaustible 
ocean  of  being.  We  have  to  measure  that  before 
we  can  measure  the  man  that  is  to  be. 

The  movement  is  a  slow  one,  for,  as  Herbert 
Spencer  points  out,  '*  the  higher  the  organisms  the 
longer  they  take  to  evolve."  In  certain  directions, 
indeed,  there  are  retardations  and  retrogressions. 
Civilisation  has  played  havoc  with  some  of  our 
faculties.  Horology  has  destroyed  our  sense  of 
time.  Koads  and  sign-posts  have  robbed  us  of  the 
instinct  of  the  savage  by  which  he  finds  his  way 
unerringly  across  hundreds  of  miles  of  trackless 
forest.  We  neither  see,  nor  hear,  nor  smell  with 
the  quickness  and  accuracy  of  the  man  of  the 
woods.  Even  in  the  direction  of  the  higher  arts 
we  appear  to  have  lost  some  things.  The  execution 

34 


OUR  NEW  SENSES  35 

of  a  certain  Etruscan  brooch,  representing  three 
bees  poised  on  a  flower,  could  not  be  successfully 
copied  by  modern  Parisian  experts,  in  spite  of 
repeated  attempts.  The  Egyptians  had  a  secret 
of  colours  that  are  as  brilliant  to-day  as  four 
thousand  years  ago.  In  that  time  our  aniline 
dyes  would  have  absolutely  disappeared. 

But  these  are  details  that  do  not  affect  the  main 
result.  Even  in  the  matter  of  the  senses  civilisation 
has  given  more  than  it  has  taken  away.  In  the 
telescope,  the  microscope,  the  spectroscope,  and 
a  score  of  other  instruments,  man  has  reinforced 
his  eyesight  and  other  senses  to  a  degree  which 
the  savage  cannot  even  comprehend.  His  steam- 
engine,  his  motor-car,  carry  him  faster  than  the 
swiftest  brave  can  run.  One  may  say  that  the 
mind  of  the  modern  man  has  constructed  for  him  a 
series  of  outside  senses  which  augment  a  hundredfold 
the  force  of  his  physical  organs.  The  Indian  with 
his  ear  to  the  ground  could  catch  the  crackle  of  a 
leaf,  the  beat  of  a  horsehoof  at  a  distance  which 
seems  incredible  to  the  untrained  townsman.  But 
the  townsman,  in  return,  putting  his  ear  to  a 
telephone  receiver,  listens  to  a  message  across  a 
space  which  transcends  the  Indian's  faculty  as 
hopelessly  as  the  express  train  beats  him  in  speed. 
We  may  say  that  the  upward  movement  has  endowed 
us  with  a  new  sense  apparatus. 

But  it  is  not  along  these  lines  specially  that  we 
are  now  thinking.  It  is  to  the  evolution  of  what 
may  be  called  certain  internal  senses  that  we  ask 
our  readers'  attention.  As  we  survey  history  and 
literature,  and  note  the  way  of  thinking  and  feeling 


36          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

of  our  fellows  ages  ago,  we  discern  at  once  a  difference 
so  great  that  it  points  to  the  emergence  in  the  mind 
of  at  least  the  germs  of  new  faculties.  The  mind 
of  man,  we  perceive,  is  steadily  being  remade. 
Let  us  point  out  in  one  or  two  directions  what 
precisely  we  mean. 

There  has,  then,  to  begin  with,  come  to  the 
modern  consciousness  a  faculty  we  fail  to  discern 
earlier,  in  the  shape  of  what  is  frequently  called 
"  the  historical  sense."  By  that  we  mean  the 
power  of  realising  the  past  exactly  as  it  was,  of 
placing  bygone  ages  in  the  dry  light  of  actuality, 
of  cutting  clean  through  the  enormous  and  fantastic 
structures  which  the  human  imagination  has  con- 
structed round  certain  events,  and  reaching  the 
bare,  simple  fact.  To  appreciate  the  essential 
modernness  of  this  faculty,  its  entire  absence  from 
the  ablest  minds  of  a  not  remote  past,  we  have  only 
to  consult  the  historical  records  of  the  times  before 
our  own.  One  might,  indeed,  go  beyond  history — 
to  art,  for  instance.  The  mediaeval,  and  even  the 
Renaissance,  painters  were  quite  without  the 
historical  sense.  They  had  no  feeling  for  actuality. 
The  "  Christ  in  the  Pharisee's  House "  of  Paul 
Veronese,  a  splendid  piece  of  work  so  far  as  colour 
and  drawing  are  concerned,  is,  as  to  its  historic 
setting,  a  banquet  of  the  middle  ages  rather  than 
of  the  first  century  in  Palestine.  The  treatment 
would  be  as  impossible  to  the  modern  painter  as 
would  be  Bonaventura's  handling  of  the  life  of 
St.  Francis  to  M.  Paul  Sabatier. 

It  is  to  the  appearance  and  steady  growth  of  this 
new  faculty  that  we  may  look  for  changes  of  the 


OUR  NEW  SENSES  37 

vastest  consequence  in  the  domain  of  man's  relations 
with  the  past,  in  the  domain,  that  is  to  say,  of  history 
and  religion.  The  earlier  mind  could  not  see  clearly 
if  it  would.  The  medium  in  which  it  worked  was 
so  charged  with  preconceptions,  with  unscientific 
views  of  the  universe,  that  it  had  no  means  of 
reaching  the  actual  fact.  It  was  like  searching  for 
a  needle  in  a  London  fog.  There  were  no  rules  or 
instruments  of  accurate  research  ;  no  sense,  indeed, 
of  the  paramount  value  of  accuracy.  The  happen- 
ings of  past  times  were  seen  by  their  recorders  on 
the  background  of  a  universe  in  which  any  and  every 
monstrosity  was  possible  ;  the  more  monstrous  the 
more  possible.  This  attitude  of  mind  was,  we 
have  to  remember,  that  of  all  the  classical  writers, 
of  all  the  early  Christian  writers,  of  all  the  mediaeval 
writers,  and  of  all  the  theological  writers  up  to  a 
very  late  date  indeed.  So  little  did  they  regard 
accuracy,  that  forgery  in  what  seemed  a  good 
cause  was  deemed  a  pious  exercise.  The  writers 
of  the  "  Acts  of  Paul  and  Thecla,"  of  the  "  Gospel 
of  Peter,"  and  similar  productions  never  imagined 
that  the  false  use  of  an  Apostle's  name  was  morally, 
not  to  say  historically  condemnable.  Their  mental 
condition  was  also  that  of  the  Church  Fathers,  whose 
miracle  stories  were  so  mercilessly  exposed  by 
Middleton  in  his  famous  "  Inquiry."  It  is,  we 
say,  a  new  mental  development  which  compels 
the  modern  mind,  in  contrast  with  all  this,  to 
judge  of  the  occurrences  of  the  first  century  by 
the  occurrences  of  our  own  ;  and  to  be  perfectly 
sure  that  nothing  happened  hi  Judaea  at  that  or 
any  other  time  that  might  not  happen  in  London 


38  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

or  New  York  in  our  own.  We  are  only 
beginning  dimly  to  recognise  the  changes  in  our 
thought  -  world  that  the  rise  and  operation  of 
this  faculty  will  accomplish.  We  see  enough,  how- 
ever, to  be  aware  that  it  will  make  all  things  new. 

Another  of  the  higher  senses,  whose  operation, 
in  its  present  form,  constitutes  a  new  evolution, 
is  that  of  universal  sympathy.  The  idea  of  regarding 
the  whole  human  family  as  the  subject  of  friendly 
regards,  as  essentially  one  with  us,  and  that  inde- 
pendently of  race,  creed  or  colour,  is,  as  regards 
average  men,  practically  an  acquisition  of  our  time. 
The  great  world  teachers,  Jesus,  Gautama,  Confucius, 
possessed  it,  but  for  ages  it  was  absent  from  the 
common  brain.  Legislators,  statesmen,  theologians 
constructed  their  systems  as  though  unaware  of 
its  existence.  Qui  Deum  amat,  amat  omnes,  says 
Leibnitz,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  it  has  not  been  so. 
There  have  been  innumerable  sincere  lovers  of  God 
who  have  had  no  such  feeling  for  their  fellow-men 
as  that  which  now  is  everywhere  gaining  ground. 
With  what  complacency  Plato  and  Aristotle  base 
their  ideal  state  on  slavery  !  And  Cicero  is  con- 
vinced, as  he  tells  us  in  the  De  Officiis,  that  "  it 
is  not  contrary  to  nature  to  despoil,  if  you  can, 
him  whom  it  is  a  virtue  to  slay."  The  most  culti- 
vated minds  of  classic  antiquity  could  not  conceive 
of  the  outsider  other  than  as  an  enemy.  Theology, 
for  long  ages,  did  not  improve  matters  in  this 
respect.  Its  doctrine  of  election,  which  carried  the 
savage  tribal  hatred  into  its  conceptions  of  the 
Divine  government,  was  the  emphatic  denial  of 
human  solidarity.  Augustine's  "  City  of  God  " 


OUR  NEW  SENSES  39 

is  founded  on  the  notion  of  two  species  of  men, 
the  blessed  and  the  accursed.  At  the  Reformation, 
and  for  long  after,  Protestants  and  Catholics 
regarded  each  other  as  dogs  and  reprobates,  to 
whom  no  quarter  was  to  be  shown  in  this  world  or 
the  next.  John  Knox  recommended  the  burning 
of  Bonner  ;  Calvin  advised  the  Protector  Somerset 
"  to  punish  well  with  the  sword  Catholics  and  fanatic 
Gospellers."  The  saintly  Fenelon  approved  the  < 
infamous  Dragonnades  of  Louis  XIV.  All  this  is 
impossible  to  the  modern  mind.  The  brain  of 
humanity  has  risen  to  the  height  of  an  entirely  new 
view.  It  is  conscious  of  a  fresh  inner  sense,  the 
sense  of  the  human  oneness.  It  has  acquired  a 
kind  of  X-ray  which,  penetrating  beneath  the 
material  envelopes  of  sects  and  creeds,  discovers  the 
one  universal  soul ;  a  soul  that  suffers,  grows, 
aspires,  in  one  common  movement  and  effort. 
This  sense  will  also,  like  the  other,  work  enormous 
changes.  It  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  any  gospel 
that  is  not  a  gospel  of  the  whole  striving  brotherhood. 
It  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  Imperialisms  that 
point  their  edge  against  other  peoples.  It  will 
have  nothing  to  do  with  election  doctrines  that 
leave  other  men  out.  It  cannot  think  of  a  God 
that  is  less  kind  than  itself. 

There  remains  the  greatest  of  all  man's  higher 
senses,  his  sense  of  the  spiritual.  We  cannot,  in 
one  way,  speak  of  that  as  a  new  sense.  One  would 
call  it  the  oldest  in  existence.  Assuredly  what  it 
stands  for  is  the  oldest  thing  in  the  universe.  And 
yet,  as  related  to  human  life  as  a  whole,  it  may  still 
be  regarded  as  the  youngest  of  the  faculties.  Man's 


40  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

animal  nature  is  old  almost  as  the  world.  It  derives 
from  all  the  million  years  of  our  planet's  animal 
story.  Compared  with  this  his  spiritual  quality 
is  indeed  a  late  arrival.  It  is  as  yet  a  mere  streak 
on  the  top  of  his  nature,  a  babe  new-born  amid  the 
ferocious  tribe  of  his  animalities.  But  the  babe  has 
all  the  future  before  it.  That  streak  of  dawn  means 
a  long  and  splendid  day  to  come.  Goethe's  "  Die 
Oeisterwelt  ist  nlcht  verschlossen "  is  the  greatest 
thing  that  can  be  uttered  about  man.  ^  The  religious 
feeling,  that  baffling  mystery  to  the  psychologist ; 
with  its  mystic  exaltations,  with  its  attendant 
phenomena  of  dream,  of  vision,  of  psychic  forces  ; 
with  its  stupendous  moral  driving  power,  with  its 
possibilities  of  all  that  is  exquisite  in  feeling ; 
with  its  hints  of  unimaginable  acquisitions  yet  to 
be  realised  ;  the  religious  feeling,  we  say,  is  of  all 
the  senses  of  man's  inner  nature  the  one  that  carries 
in  it  the  richest  promise. 

A  supremely  important  question  remains.  What 
is  the  mode  of  development  of  our  higher  senses  ? 
The  whole  scientific  teaching  here  points  one  way. 
We  develop  by  effort,  by  struggle.  It  is  under 
strain  and  pressure  that  the  organism  evolves. 
Anyone  who  realises  that  simple  fact  should  see  in 
it  an  all-sufficient  reason  for  the  arduous,  the  strenu- 
ous life.  And  that  to  its  very  close.  The  law 
which  bids  us  "  scorn  delights  and  live  laborious 
days,"  which  assures  us  that 

Mortals  miss 
Fair  prospects  by  a  level  bliss, 

is  the  very  central  law  of  life.  To  preserve  our 
faculties  at  their  topmost  level  by  constant  work  ; 


OUR  NEW   SENSES  41 

to  abhor  and  keep  from  the  ruts  of  luxurious  ease  ; 
to  welcome  the  opportunity  of  sacrifice,  the  doing 
of  things  that  crucify  the  flesh  ;  to  maintain  in 
every  department  the  strict  subordination  of  lower 
to  higher,  of  animal  to  spiritual — this  we  are  coming 
now  to  recognise  is  not  only  the  teaching  of  the 
New  Testament  Gospel ;  it  is  seen  by  science  to  be 
the  one  and  only  way  upward. 


II 


"As  an  alienist,  and  one  whose  whole  life  has  been 
concerned  with  the  sufferings  of  the  mind,  I  would 
state  that  of  all  the  hygienic  measures  to  counteract 
disturbed  sleep,  depression  of  spirits,  and  all  the 
miserable  sequels  of  a  distressed  mind,  I  would 
undoubtedly  give  the  first  place  to  the  simple 
habit  of  prayer."  To  this  effect  spoke  Dr.  Hyslop, 
the  distinguished  specialist,  to  his  medical  brethren 
at  a  recent  Congress.  The  utterance  is  noteworthy, 
both  for  the  words  themselves  and  the  audience 
to  which  they  were  addressed.  Of  all  men  in  the 
world,  the  average  Englishman  is  the  most  reticent 
on  the  subject  of  religion.  One  might  suppose 
it  had  never  been  properly  acclimatised  with  him. 
He  wears  it  awkwa'rdly,  as  though  it  were  a  misfit, 
ask  him  for  an  expression  of  it  is  to  produce 
on  him  the  effect  of  an  indecent  exposure]  And 
the  medical  faculty  has  shared  to  the  full  this  insular 
singularity  of  ours.  Doctors  have  been  supposed, 
indeed,  to  be  specially  inclined  to  scepticism. 
"  Tres  medici  duo  athei  "  is  a  hackneyed  proverb,  and 
still  current.  The  deliverance  we  have  quoted, 
calmly  offered  to  this  specialist  audience  as  a 

42 


THE  PSYCHOLOGY  OP  PRAYER         43 

scientific  observation  resulting  from  experience,  ia 
then,  we  say,  a  notable  fact,  worthy  our  best 
consideration. 

It  reveals,  for  one  thing,  that  new  attitude  towards 
religion  which  prescient  minds  already  discern 
as  the  note  of  the  coming  age.  We  have  remarked 
on  the  awkwardness  of  English  religion.  That  is 
the  result  of  its  having  been  so  largely  a  convention, 
an  artificiality  with  which  we  have  had  no  proper 
relations.  But  this  is  already,  in  the  best  minds, 
passing  away.  We  are  on  the  way  to  naturalness 
because  we  are  on  the  way  to  humanness.  Science 
is  the  new  religious  mediator.  It  is  entering  this 
great  region  of  the  human  consciousness  as  a  realm 
whose  facts  and  experiences  demand  its  closest 
investigation.  It  is  beginning  to  realise  the 
absurdity  and  mischief  of  its  previous  shyness  in 
relation  to  them.  And  thus  it  will  come  about 
that  what  has  been  previously  held  as  the  exclusive 
property  of  theologians,  to  be  dealt  with  in  a  jargon 
of  their  own  by  the  pulpit  and  the  "  religious 
world,"  will  be  recognised  once  more  as  a  common 
property,  a  recognised  part  of  the  inalienable 
human  possession. 

We  treat  Dr.  Hyslop's  declaration  on  prayer  as  a 
sign  of  this  new  attitude.  He  discusses  prayer, 
not  theologically,  but  as  a  phase  of  consciousness, 
a  recognised  activity  of  the  human  spirit.  That 
is  the  new  way.  Our  fathers  started  their  religious 
explorations  from  a  standpoint  in  the  heavens,, 
attainable  only  in  their  imagination.  Hence  a 
system  handed  down  to  us  which  we  feel  to  be 
saturated  with  unrealities.  We  are  to-day  building 


44  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

on  surer  ground.  AVe  commence  with  ourselves, 
with  the  things  we  know  and  feel^>  It  is  from  this 
standpoint  we  can  best  discuss  prayer.  And 
dealing  with  it  thus,  we  see  how  far  we  have  travelled 
from  the  mid- Victorian  position,  when  Tyndall  and 
Huxley  threw  down  their  challenge  to  the  Church  to 
experiment  about  the  efficacy  of  prayer  in  a  hospital 
ward.  So  far  have  we  travelled  that  science  can 
no  longer  think  on  those  lines.  It  has  been  forced 
off  them  on  to  a  new  track.  Let  us  see,  in  one  or 
two  directions,  how  the  matter  now  stands. 

There  is,  first  of  all,  the  old  a  priori  philosophical 
objection  to  prayer.  It  used  to  be  argued  as  absurd 
to  suppose  that  the  mere  wish  of  a  man,  as  expressed 
in  devotion,  should  cause  any  deviation  in  the  settled 
order  of  the  universe.  The  eternal  law  to  be  turned 
aside  by  a  wish  !  The  infinite  wisdom  which  fore- 
sees all  to  take  orders  from  a  suppliant  who  foresees 
nothing  U^*Is  not  this  for  the  fly  on  the  wheel  to 
govern  the  machinery  ;  for  Phaethon  to  take  in 
hand  once  more  the  chariot  of  the  sun  ?  It  is 
curious  to  note  how  these  ideas  seem  still  to  obsess 
a  certain  order  of  mind.  The  present  writer  has 
been  frequently  asked  by  correspondents  whether, 
in  view  of  such  considerations  as  these,  he  can 
possibly  himself  believe  in  prayer. 

But  the  new  science  does  not  reason  in  this  way 
at  all.  For  one  thing,  it  is  giving  up  a  priori 
speculations  as  to  what  is  and  what  is  not  possible. 
And  that  especially  in  the  relations  between  the 
finite  and  the  Infinite.  For  here  we  can  pile  up 
by  the  score  absolute  contradictions  that  are  yet 
facts.  ^Ve  can  prove  motion  impossible,  and  yjet 


THE  PSYCHOLOGY  OF  PRAYER          46 

we  know  things  move.  We  argue  a  philosophic 
necessity,  and  yet  act  on  the  supposition  that  our 
will  is  free.  The  latest  science  is  coming  back  to 
an  absolutely  homogeneous  something  as  the 
ultimate  beginning,  and  yet  declaring  this  homo- 
geneous something  to  be  the  cause  of  all  variety  ! 
We  have  to  accept  these  seeming  contraries,  and 
to  recognise  at  the  start  that  our  mind  is  not  on  a 
scale  for  estimating  truly  the  relation  of  the  finite 
to  the  Infinite. 

But  that  is  only  the  beginning.  The  argument 
against  prayer  based  on  the  distance  between  God 
and  man  is  really  to-day  out  of  date.  We  suspect 
now  that  these  two  are  more  nearly  related  than  we 
thought.  Modern  philosophy,  especially  since  Hegel, 
has  regarded  man  as  the  chief  mode,  on  this  planet, 
of  the  Divine  consciousness.  It  is  in  the  human 
soul  that  the  Divine  thought,  immanent  in  the 
universe,  comes  to  its  self-expression.  It  is  thus 
that  the  modern  mind  thinks  of  the  Incarnation. 
Humanity  itself  is  an  incarnation.  As  Augustine 
has  it,  when  we  dig  deep  enough  into  the  human 
we  find  the  Divine. 

When  we  come,  therefore,  with  these  considera- 
tions in  mind,  to  our  question — "  Can  a  frail  mortal 
influence    by    his    prayer    the    Eternal    Power  ?  '' 
we  are  at  another  standpoint  for  discussing  it.     The  \ 
question,  we  discover,  is,  "  How  much  in  prayer  is  1 
of  the  frail  mortal,"  and  how  much  of  "  the  Eternal) 
Power  "  ?     And  in  this  argument  also,    let  it  be 
noted,   it  is  prayer  in  its  truest  expression,   and 
not   in  its   imperfect  forms,   that   is   in   question. 
As  Aristotle  has   taught  us,   our  judgment   of  a 


46  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

thing  is  to  be  formed,  not  from  its  beginnings  or 
its  history,  but  from  the  perfect  idea  of  it  which 
the  beginning  and  the  history  are  labouring  to 
exhibit.  Nature  always  begins  her  creations  low 
down.  And  prayer,  considered  historically,  begins 
low  enough.  But  the  beginning  is  not  the  end. 
To  decide  on  it  from  a  study  of  savage  incantations, 
of  pagan  priests  with  their  "  0  Baal,  hear  us  !  ", 
of  Tartar  prayer-wheels,  of  the  naive  proposals  of 
some  modern  religionists  to  make  God  the 
accomplice  of  their  selfish  schemes,  is  to  go  beside 
the  mark.  Yet  even  these,  at  their  lowest,  rightly 
considered,  carry  the  great  argument  and  justifica- 
tion of  prayer.  /  For  they  represent  man's  mysterious 
right,  felt  as  a  right  at  the  inmost  of  him,  to  appeal 
from  the  visible  to  the  invisible.  These  crudest 
forms  are,  after  all,  a  natural  movement  of  the  soul, 
an  instinct  born  of  pur  nature  and  of  our  position 
in  the  scheme  of  things  ;  an  instinct  to  which 
we  feel  the  universe  has  provided  adequate  response. 
And  when  we  trace  this  movement  upward  to 
its  higher  manifestations,  the  more  certain  do  we 
become  of  its  entire  appropriateness,  and  of  its 
marvellous  inner  efficacy.  We  realise  in  these 
experiences  the  fulfilment  of  that  law,  that  wherever 
you  challenge  the  higher  possibilities  of  the  universe 
it  reacts  upon  you  with  entire  generosity.  Prayer 
is  in  this  sense  the  exercise  of  the  soul's  responsive- 
ness, of  its  receptivity.  It  follows  here  with  pre- 
cision the  whole  process  of  human  development. 
Man  has  grown  in  all  his  departments  of  living  by 
this  method.  It  is  the  method  of  preparing  himself 
for  the  action  on  him  of  outside  forces.  Light, 


THE  PSYCHOLOGY  OF  PRAYER          47 

heat,  electricity,  the  chemical  actions  and  reactions, 
all  these  were  in  his  world  from  the  beginning, 
waiting  for  his  appropriation.  The  savage  was\ 
savage  because  of  his  lack  of  response  to  them.  1 
As  his  receptive  surface  became  widened  by  know- 
ledge, he  took  in  of  these  waiting  powers,  until  now 
they  are  his  workers  of  miracles.  Prayer,  on  pre- 
cisely the  same  lines,  is  the  appeal  to  subtler  forces 
even  than  these.  It  is  a  receptiveness  on  an  even 
grander  scale.  It  recognises,  as  Clifford  Harrison 
in  his  "  Notes  on  the  Margins  "  has  excellently 
put  it,  that  "  if  waves  of  force  pass  through  earth 
and  rock  ;  if  certain  forms  of  light  pass  through 
our  bodies  .....  v  .  it  may  well  be  that  psychic 
and  mental  force  can  be  and  is  transmitted  and 
exercised  in  a  hundred  unknown  and  mysterious, 
but  absolutely  natural  ways  in  the  unrecognised 
ether  of  thought." 

To  put  it  broadly,  prayer  on  the  human  side  is 
man's  declared  alliance  with  the  Infinite.  It  is  the 
sap  in  us,  all  the  warm  life-current  in  us,  rising 
past  every  intermediate  object  of  desire  to  our  very 
topmost,  and  thence  streaming  out  to  meet  that 
higher  Beyond  of  which  it  knows  itself  a  part. 
For  we  know  ourselves  not  as  a  finished  product, 
but  as  rather  a  process,  a  becoming,  and  in  prayer 
we  seek  the  element  which  is  making  u&.  It  is  in 
this  conception  we  finally  meet  the  objection, 
absurd  in  itself,  of  prayer  being  the  dictation  of 
weakness  and  ignorance  to  the  all-governing 
wisdom.  The  objection  ignores  the  whole  system 
of  things  in  this  world.  It  supposes  that  man's 
prayer  begins  with  man,  whereas  nothing  in  man 


48          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

begins  with  him.  It  began  first  in  his  universe,  in 
his  Maker.  It  is  as  the  action  of  sun  and  rain.  From 
out  of  the  ocean  the  sun  draws  up  the  vapours, 
which  later  come  back  hi  showers  upon  the  earth. 
Here  is  a  circulation  from  deep  to  height,  and  from 
height  again  to  deep.  So,  under  the  shining  of  the 
Sun  behind  the  sun,  out  of  the  deeps  of  man's  mind 
and  heart  are  carried  up  the  invisible  currents  of  his 
aspiration  and  soul's  desire,  to  descend  afterwards 
in  secret  responses  which  he  knows,  nevertheless, 
to  be  real.  Real,  though  the  first  form  of  his 
desire  is  often  enough  left  unanswered.  The  response 
lies,  indeed,  often  enough  in  the  heightening  and 
purification  of  his  desire.  In  Gethsemane's  agony 
he  prays,  maybe,  for  his  cup  to  pass  from  him.  He 
leaves  the  garden  with  no  other  wish  than  that 
God's  will  be  done. 

Apart,  then,  entirely  from  considerations  of 
technical  theology,  prayer  will  come  more  and  more 
to  be  recognised  as  an  indubitable  spiritual  experi- 
ence, as  a  moral  force  of  the  first  quality.  It  is 
indispensable  to  the  man  who  would  deal  with 
and  judge  men  and  things  from  the  highest  plane. 
Its  reactions  on  the  human  spirit  and  in  the  world 
of  affairs  are,  indeed,  incalculable.  For  this  reason 
alone  it  is  time  that  science  took  up,  as  it  has  not 
yet  attempted  to  do,  the  whole  literature  of  prayer — 
took  it  up  as  a  unique  study  of  the  soul  in  the 
greatest  of  its  manifestations.  There  is  no  literature 
on  the  whole  so  wonderful.  Who  wants  man  at  his 
highest  cannot  leave  this  page  unturned.  It  would 
be  an  entirely  new  sensation  for  our  generation  to 
leave  the  latest  novel,  and  to  Uike  a  turn  instead 


THE  PSYCHOLOGY  OF  PRAYER          49 

at  the  world's  devotional  record.  We  should  not 
pronounce  on  this  subject  until  we  know  what  men 
before  us  have  accomplished  in  it ;  until  we  know 
our  Augustine,  our  Francis,  our  Luther,  our  St. 
Teresa,  our  Madame  Guyon,  our  Andrewes  and  Wil- 
son, our  Methodist  Bramwell,  our  Romanist  Vianney. 

We  cannot  come  into  contact  with  these  great 
spirits  without  realising  that,  apart  from  their 
varying  opinions  on  speculative  points,  they  were 
in  their  prayers  on  the  common  ground  of  a  great 
spiritual  reality.  What  may  be  the  precise  relation 
of  our  nature  to  that  unseen  side  of  things  to  which 
in  prayer  it  appeals,  we  may  not  accurately  know. 
But  this  we  are  assured  of,  that  the  response  from 
that  other  side  is  immense.  Under  certain  inspira~ 
tions  the  giants  of  faith  have  asked  and  received, 
because  the  asking  and  the  receiving  were  alike 
of  God.  It  is  in  this  region  the  heroes  have  found 
their  strength.  Gordon  in  his  tent  here  won  his 
battles  beforehand.  Here  the  common  man  con-  . 
quers  himself  and  the  world.  Fides  impetrat  quce 
lex  imperat.  "  Faith  obtains  what  the  law  enjoins." 

There  are  all  kinds  of  prayer.  Much  of  it  in  a 
well-attuned  man  is  a  joyful  acquiescence.  As 
Coleridge  has  it : 

No  wish  conceived,  no  thought  expressed, 
Only  a  sense  of  supplication, 
A  sense  o'er  all  my  soul  impressed 
That  I  am  weak,  yet  not  unblessed 
Since  in  me,  round  me,  everywhere, 
Eternal  strength  and  wisdom  are. 

But  a  man  in  healthy  contact  with  the  unseen 
will  not  be  content  with  that.  To  such,  as  a 

4 


50          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

mediaeval  mystic  puts  it,  "  seeking  is  as  good  as 
beholding."  There  arises  in  us  a  sense  of  intimacy 
in  which,  as  Marie  Bashkirtseff  daringly  puts  it, 
we  find  "  a  God  from  whom  we  can  ask  everything, 
and  to  whom  we  can  tell  everything."  We  may 
go  even  .further  and  say,  as  did  Fenelon  to  an 
inquirer,  "  Si  Dieu  vous  ennuie,  dites  lui  qu'il 
vous  ennuie"  That  is  the  highest  intimacy. 

In  sum.  Religion  will  come  back  to  its  true 
place  when  it  is  put  once  more  on  a  natural  basis. 
We  discover  that  basis  in  the  study  of  the  soul's 
nature  and  powers.  Chief  among  those  powers  is 
prayer,  the  faculty  by  which  man  expresses  his 
affinity  with  the  Unseen.  In  the  exercise  of  it  he 
widens  immeasurably  his  relations  with  the  Universe, 
and  increases  beyond  all  reckoning  the  sum  of  his 
inner  resource. 


Ill 
The  Religion  of  Calamity 

PERHAPS  the  most  immediate  effect  of  the  San 
Francisco  disaster  was  the  shock  it  gave  to  men's 
religious  convictions.  Good  Christian  people  asked 
the  most  startling  questions.  The  event  indeed 
seemed  to  have  no  ascertainable  connection  with 
orthodoxy.  Nature  was  here  actiitg  with  a  savagery 
more  brutal  than  that  of  the  greatest  savage  we 
know.  The  Hottentot,  the  Australian  bushman, 
has  a  heart  and  conscience  of  some  sort,  but  people 
see  no  heart  or  conscience  in  this  wreckage.  Could 
there  be  any  approximation  to  feeling,  to  love  as 
we  know  it,  in  a  Power  which  murdered  and  de- 
stroyed in  such  fashion  ?  Moreover,  could  men 
continue  to  regard  themselves  as  of  any  serious 
account  in  a  universe  which  treated  them  thus  ; 
which  paid  seemingly  as  much  attention  to  their 
tears  and  prayers  as  to  the  buzz  of  summer  flies  ?  In 
those  hours  of  horror  man  rushed  everywhere  to  help 
his  brother,  but  there  seemed  no  help  outside  man. 

< 

The  sky  which  noticed  all  makes  no  disclosure, 
And  the  earth  keeps  up  her  terrible  composure. 

This  apparent  cosmic  indifference  to  human  welfare 
is  the  feature  of  life  which,  perhaps,  more  than  any 

51 


52 

other,  has  impressed  itself  on  the  modern  conscious- 
ness. "  There  is  no  justice  in  the  outside  universe," 
says  a  modern  writer  ;  "  justice  exists  only  in  the 
soul."  A  German  poet  of  to-day  echoes  the  senti- 
ment : 

Das  ganze  Weltall  zeigt  nur  Leid  und  Pein  ; 

Jedoch  das  Mitleid    fiihlt  der  Mensch  allein  ! 

"  The  whole  world  shows  but  sorrow  and  pain,  but 
compassion  is  felt  by  man  alone." 

The  questions  that  are  here  raised  are  of  course 
not  new.  They  are  as  old  as  the  world.  Man's 
earliest  experiences  were  not  of  a  nature  to  teach 
him  an  easy  optimism.  What  happened  to  himself 
and  his  neighbour  was  indeed,  at  times,  of  a  character 
to  excite  his  worst  fears.  As  soon  as  he  began  to 
think  he  seems  to  have  framed  two  hypotheses 
about  his  position  :  one,  that  he  was  the  sport  of 
blind  chance  or  fate  ;  the  other,  that  he  was  in  the 
hands  of  invisible  beings  as  cruel  as  himself,  but 
a  great  deal  more  powerful,  and  whom  he  must 
propitiate  by  all  available  means.  The  latter  is 
evidently  the  older  of  the  two  beliefs.  Primitive 
man  personalised  everything.  Thunder  and  light- 
ning, earthquake,  flood,  were  the  signs  of  some- 
body's anger.  x  Early  world  religion  was  accordingly 
largely  a  religion  of  calamity.  Its  grand  stimulant 
was  fear.  "  Timor  fecit  deos"  Livy's  remark  that 
it  is  more  natural  for  man  to  be  impressed  by  his 
catastrophes  than  by  his  prosperities  is  here  strictly 
appropriate.  Terror  goes  deeper  than  joy,  and 
it  was  terror  that  reared  the  altars.  Plutarch 
seems  to  mean  this  in  his  remark  that  "  man's 
attention,  especially  in  what  concerns  the  worship 


THE  RELIGION  OF  CALAMITY  53 

of  the  gods,  is  seldom  fixed  but  by  a  sort  of  violence 
and  constraint."  And  it  is  the  great  argument 
of  Lucretius,  in  his  attack  upon  the  current  beliefs, 
that  in  ridding  themselves  of  religion  men  would  be 
freed  from  the  terrors  which  made  cowards  of  them 
all. 

The  other  view,  that  does  away  with  personality 
and  declares  the  world  to  be  the  product  of  blind, 
unconscious  forces,  is,  we  say,  a  later  one.  It 
seems  to  spring  naturally  out  of  the  decay  of  a 
civilisation.  It  fits  that  mood  of  hopelessness 
which  comes  from  a  surfeit  of  unhealthy  living. 
It  is  to  a  Rome  decayed  from  its  pristine  vigour  and 
sunk  in  gross  sensuality,  that  Propertius,  in  elegant 
elegiacs,  preaches  the  doctrine  of  devil-may-careism 
as  the  only  true  philosophy.  "  While  the  Fates 
permit  let  us  satiate  our  eyes  with  lust,  seeing  the 
long  night  hastens  to  which  there  will  be  no  succeed- 
ing day."  Out  of  a  like  temper,  though  with  a 
less  cynical  note,  Sulpicius  writes  to  Cicero,  on  the 
death  of  his  daughter :  "  Why,"  he  asks, "  bemoan 
the  death  of  a  girl,  when  she  and  all  of  us,  together 
with  cities  and  empires,  are  passing  down  the 
throat  of  everlasting  oblivion  ?  "  In  some  well- 
known  lines  Ennius  argues  away  the  idea  of  a 
Providence.  If,  says  he,  "  the  gods  cared  anything 
about  man  it  would  be  well  with  the  good  and  ill 
with  the  wicked.  But  that,  we  see,  is  not  the  case." 
The  mood  here  has  indeed,  age  after  age,  been  a 
literary  fashion.  Omar  Khayyam  voices  it,  in 
lines  which  are  the  laughter  of  despair  : 

Drink,  for  we  know  not  whence  we  came,  nor  why, 
Drjnk,  for  we  know  not  why  we  go,  nor  where  ! 


54          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

The  old  Persian  was  never  more  relished  than  to-day. 
There  is  a  multitude  now  of  his  denomination. 

What,  then,  with  all  this  in  view,  has  religion 
to  say  for  itself  ?  Assuredly  this  attitude  of 
humanity,  and  the  things  that  have  occasioned  it, 
are  not  to  be  passed  over  lightly.  The  truth- 
seeker  will  give  to  every  one  of  these  considerations 
its  due  weight.  But  when  the  utmost  has  been 
urged  on  that  side,  how  does  the  account  stand  ? 
Dismissing,  as  we  may  easily  do,  the  notion  of  an 
unseen  malevolence  as  the  cause  of  our  human 
calamities,  what  evidence  do  these  disasters  offer 
against  the  contrary  Christian  view  of  a  benign 
Providence  as  directing  our  affairs  ?  How  far  do 
they  support  a  doctrine  of  chance  medley  ?  The 
first  thing  here  to  be  said  is  that  the  Universe, 
regarded  as  a  whole,  obstinately  refuses  to  be 
taken  at  this  valuation.  Earthquakes,  and  the 
whole  line  of  destructions  for  which  they  stand,  are, 
we  perceive,  not  the  only  things  in  it.  They  are, 
in  fact,  only  an  insignificant  part  of  all  we  see. 
Just  as  clear  to  us  as  the  brutality  of  these 
forces,  is  the  spirituality  of  other  forces.  When 
you  have  loaded  one  scale  you  have  to  begin 
to  load  the  other.  Nature's  wholesale  murders  are 
a  part  of  life.  True,  and  so  are  art  and  science, 
beauty  and  happiness,  the  death  of  Christ  and  the 
soul's  aspirations.  We  cannot  work  out  our  sum 
without  taking  in  these  factors.  If  the  other  side 
means  something  so  does  this,  and  the  question  is, 
Which  means  most  ? 

It  is,  indeed,  curious,  when  we  come  to  think  of 
it^that  our  accusation  against  Nature  on  such 


THE  RELIGION  OF  CALAMITY  55 

occasions   as    the   present    seems    to    rest    entirely 
on  her  mode  of  action  instead  of  on  the  action  itself. 

is  when  she  kills  or  destroys  suddenly  and  whole-  ' 
sale  that  we  exclaim  and  despair.^  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  in  these  operations  she  is  only  doing  what  she 
is  always  doing,  in  another  way.  She  kills  a  thou- 
sand people  in  an  earthquake,  but  she  will  kill  the 
fifteen  hundred  million  of  us  now  alive  on  this 
planet  just  as  certainly,  and  all  the  generations 
that  are  to  follow.  Every  birth  carries  with  it 
a  sentence  of  death.  "  Nascentes  morimur,  finisque 
ab  origine  pendet"  Faith  has  long  ago  accustomed 
itself  to  death,  has  indeed  flourished  upon  it.  The 
best  thought  of  Greece  and  Rome  refused  to  regard 
it  as  an  evil.  "  No  one,"  says  Socrates,  in  his 
Apology,  "  knows  whether  death,  which  men  in 
their  fear  apprehend  to  be  the  greatest  evil,  may 
not  be  the  greatest  good."  ^Eschylus  calls  it  the 
healer,  the  curer  of  all  ills. 

Indeed,  we  of  these  later  ages  are  in  greater 
danger  than  were  the  men  of  the  earlier  ones,  of 
taking  our  comfort-theory  as  the  ground  for  judging 
the  cosmic  morals.  We  make  the  blunder  of  regard- 
ing the  physical  consciousness  as  our  one  scale 
of  measurement.  Whereas,  as  the  deeper  philosophy 
of  our  time  has  so  abundantly  shown,  the  physical 
consciousness  offers  only  the  outermost  edge  of 
reality.  Its  verdicte  are  full  of  illusions,  full  of 
contradictions,  which  it  is  for  philosophy,  in  its 
search  for  the  core  of  things,  to  exhibit  and  to 
think  away.  It  is  the  business  of  catastrophe  and 
of  calamity  to  rid  our  thought  about  God,  the 
Supreme  Reality,  of  the  provincialism  which  we 


56          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

permit  to  cling  about  it.  Our  human  analogies 
are  no  measure  at  all  of  His  meaning  about  us. 
If  we  try  to  bring  His  working  to  that  scale,  the 
scheme  breaks  down  at  once.  We  know  the  argu- 
ment. "  We  do  not  kill  the  man  we  love.  We  do 
not,  if  we  can  help  it,  let  our  little  children  fall 
into  the  fire  and  burn  to  death.  Can  He  be  love 
who  does  slay,  who  does  let  the  fire  kindle  on  these 
innocents  ?  "  The  answer  is  simple.  Our  love 
expresses  itself  according  to  the  limitations  of  our 
knowledge.  It  is  in  that  limitation  a  true  and 
natural  expression.  But  let  us  remember  it  is 
a  limitation.  What  do  we  know  ultimately  about 
burning  and  about  slaying  ?  We  see  one  side  of 
them,  whereas  there  are  a  thousand  sides.  We 
judge  as  though  we  have  here  a  completed  transac- 
tion, whereas  \what  happens  is  only  the  beginning 
of  an  endless  series.  Could  we  see  the  whole 
process  as  God  sees  it,  the  thousand  sides  of  it  at 
present  to  us  invisible,  the  whole  infinite  series 
of  after  results,  our  feeling  concerning  it  would 
be  entirely  changed.  Our  feeling  would  then  be 
like  His. 

And  let  us  remember  that  the  shock  to  our  con- 
sciousness occasioned  by  physical  catastrophe,  the 
sense  it  creates  of  an  utter  indifference  in  nature, 
as  though  the  shaking  down  of  our  cities  were  to 
it  as  the  disturbance  of  an  anthill,  may  be  sus- 
ceptible of  an  interpretation  quite  the  opposite 
of  the  ordinary  one.  That  man  can  lose  so  much 
shows  how  rich  he  is.  But  that  is  not  all.  His 
revolt  against  the  physical  universe  here,  his  sense 
of  injury  under  its  blows,  is  in  itself  the  most 


THE  RELIGION  OF  CALAMITY  57 

significant  feature  of  the  situation.  His  attitude 
is  inexplicable  on  the  supposition  that  he  is  a  mere 
part  of  this  physical  nature.  That  he  can  lose  so 
much,  that  he  has  a  range  of  consciousness  capable 
of  being  struck  at  in  this  tremendous  way  is 
the  opposite  of  an  argument  against  the  vanity 
of  life.  It  is,  on  the  contrary,  man's  disasters, 
his  catastrophes,  that  give  the  cachet  to  his  rank 
and  his  destiny. 

To  this  is  to  be  added  that  the  common  interpre- 
tation of  these  calamities — that  they  are  entirely 
indiscriminate  in  their  dealing  with  men,  striking 
down  with  the  same  indifference  innocent  and 
guilty,  saint  and  sinner — is  equally  wide  of  the 
mark.  Here  again  we  see  how  the  surface  view, 
the  appeal  to  the  physical  consciousness,  blinds  us 
to  the  ultimate  fact.  Ennius,  whom  we  have 
quoted,  is  quite  wrong.  For  the  most  striking 
feature  of  these  events  is  the  entire  and  delicate 
discrimination  with  which  they  distribute  their 
effects.  Nature,  even  in  her  earthquake  moods, 
grades  her  dealings  with  the  nicest  exactness. 
The  one  event  may  smite  us  all,  but  each  will  take 
it  in  a  different  way.  And  our  separate  way  will 
be  in  strict  accord  with  our  entire  inner  state  and 
training.  How  different  the  same  pain  to  the 
weakling  who  howls  under  it,  and  to  a  Posidonius, 
who  in  his  torture  says  to  Pompey,  "  Pain  do  what 
thou  wilt,  I  shall  never  be  drawn  to  say  thou  art 
an  evil  !  "  It  is  a  sense  of  this  which  leads  Plato 
to  his  great  declaration  in  the  "  Republic,"  that 
*'  the  just  man,  though  stretched  on  the  rack, 
though  his  eyes  are  dug  out,  will  be  happy,"  and 


58          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

to  that  even  more  wonderful  word  of  his,  in  which 
he  anticipates  St.  Paul,  where,  speaking  again  of 
the  just  man,  he  says,  "  Even  when  he  is  in  poverty 
and  sickness,  or  any  other  seeming  misfortune, 
all  things  in  the  end  will  work  together  for  good 
to  him  in  life  and  death."  The  outer  edge  of  an 
event  is,  in  fact,  always  the  least  part  of  it.  The 
essential  is  its  relation  to  our  mental  and  spiritual 
state. 

Man  has  lived  with  catastrophes  through  all  his 
history,  and  his  faith  has  survived  them.  No  number 
of  them  in  the  future  will  persuade  him  that  the 
scheme  of  things  under  which  he  finds  himself 
is  a  farrago  of  nonsense.  He  will  persist  rather  in 
believing  with  Bourget,  that  "  this  obscure  universe 
has  a  mysterious  and  kindly  signification."  The 
people  of  San  Francisco,  we  read,  reared  altars  in 
the  midst  of  their  ruins,  and  on  the  first  Sunday 
after  they  had  lost  all  joined  their  voices  in  the 
worship  of  God.  And  many  of  them,  we  dare  say, 
felt  His  presence  as  they  had  never  felt  it  before. 
A  "  Deus  absconditus,"  a  God  that  hideth  Himself 
truly,  and  yet  One  who  in  secret  marvellous  ways 
discloses  Himself  to  the  human  spirit. 

Christianity  is,  in  the  best  sense,  a  "  Religion 
of  Calamity."  Goethe  called  it  the  religion  of 
sorrow.  Assuredly,  as  none  other,  it  has  sounded 
the  depths  of  sorrow  and  exhibited  to  us  their 
meaning.  One  who  had  sounded  those  deeps  as 
few  have  asks,  "  Is  not  He  who  made  misery  wiser 
than  thou  art  ?  "  Deepest  of  all  interpretations 
of  calamity  is  the  interpretation  of  Christ.  In  His 
Cross  we  have  a  religion  built  on  catastrophe.  Ifc 


f  THE  RELIGION  OF  CALAMITY  59 

is  a  defiance  of  it  and  a  victory  over  it.  In  Jesus, 
who,  while  enduring  there  the  worst  that  nature 
and  the  world  could  inflict,  breathes  the  name  of 
"  Father,"  we  have  the  clearest,  divinest  ray  of  light 
that,  from  the  darkened  heavens,  has  ever  shot 
athwart  the  deep  mystery  of  life. 


IV 
What    Was    Pentecost? 

PENTECOST,  as  the  Jews  knew  it,  was  one  of  those 
nature  festivals  in  which  the  early  world  expressed 
at  once  its  poetry  and  its  religion.  There  is  a  strong 
family  likeness  between  this  feast  of  first  fruits  and 
the  great  gatherings  for  mystic  rite  and  popular 
rejoicings  with  which  Rome,  Greece  and  the  East 
hailed  the  coming  of  spring  and  of  summer.  We 
do  not  sneer  to-day  at  Paganism,  any  more  than  we 
sneer  at  Judaism.  We  feel  the  solidarity  of  humanity. 
We  have  a  sympathy  born  of  insight  for  those 
who,  at  Eleusinian  mystery  or  Dionysic  procession, 
sought  to  exhibit  their  sense  of  the  mystery  of  life, 
their  desire  to  interpret  its  meaning,  their  gratitude  to 
the  Power  that  gave  it.  The  world  was  young  then, 
infantile.  We  are  so  much  wiser  to-day,  and  yet 
with  all  our  knowledge  do  we  not  miss  something 
of  that  early  exuberance  ?  We  can  understand 
Keats's  elegy  over  what  is  gone  : 

Glory  and  loveliness  have  passed  away ; 

For  if  we  wander  out  in  early  morn, 

No  wreathed  inoense  do  we  see  upborne 

Into  the  East  to  meet  the  smiling  day  ; 

No  crowd  of  nymphs,  soft-voiced  and  young  and  gay, 

In  woven  baskets  bringing  ears  of  corn, 

Roses  eyid  pinks  and  violets  to  adorn 

The  shrine  of  Flora  in  her  early  May, 


.  - 


WHAT  WAS  PENTECOST  ?  61 


That  phase  indeed  has  gone.  But  the  Jewish 
Pentecost,  decaying  like  the  rest  of  those  ancient 
festivals,  was  rgborn  to  gj\n1ifig.tij>n  in  the  most 
startling  way.  The  story  given  us  in  the  Acts  is 
the  story  of  one  of  those  ,births  of  timej  which 
introduce  a  new  era,  a  fresh  quality  of  life.  It  has 
been  largely  spoiled  for  us  by  theology.  We  have 
to  clear  away  a  good  many  of  its  conventional 
interpretations,  to  see  the  whole  happening  in 
the  light  which  modern  knowledge  sheds  upon 
it,  before  we  reach  its  true  significance.  The 
account  in  the  second  chapter  of  the  Acts  is 
not,  as  to  all  its  details,  taken  by  the  modern 
critic  au  pied  de  la  lettre.  The  earlier  chapters  of 
the  book  are  not  contemporary  history  in  the  same 
sense  as  the  "  travel  document "  which  comes 
later.  There  has  been  time  for  a  certain  embellish- 
ment. The  "  Acts  "  chapter  is  an  Eastern  story 
told  us  in  the  Eastern  way.  In  reading  it  we  are 
irresistibly  reminded  of  another  occurrence  at 
Jerusalem  three  centuries  later  and  of  the  account 
given  of  it  by  Christian  historians.  When  Julian 
the  Apostate  ordered  workmen  to  dig  the  foundations 
of  a  new  Jewish  temple,  Gregory  Nazianzen  declares 
there  was  a  whirlwind  and  an  earthquake.  There 
appeared  "  balls  of  fire."  Sozomen  and  Theodoret 
add  that  crosses,  star-shaped,  and  of  blackish 
hue,  appeared  on  the  garments  of  the  beholders. 
The  Eastern  imagination,  especially  in  matters  of 
religion,  has  always  been  a  vivid  one. 

We  have  to  construct  our  own  theory  of  what 
precisely  happened.  Neander  suggests  that  the 
external  concomitants  of  the  scene  were  largely 


62  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

subjective  impressions.     What  the  gift  of  tongues 
amounted   to   is    to  some  extent    interpreted    for 
us  by  St.  Paul's  account  of  the  "[gift,"  as  exercised 
in  the  Church  at  Corinth,  where  men  and  women 
in  a  state  of  high  exaltation  uttered  mysterious 
sounds  unintelligible  to  the  outsider,  similar,  ap- 
parently, to  the  ululations  of  the  early  Irvingite 
meetings.     These    outward    signs,    whatever    they 
were,  are  reported  to  us  in  the  narrative  as  accom- 
paniments of  the  descent  of  "  the  Holy  Ghost." 
We  are  not  so  sure  to-day  as  were  our  fathers  that 
the    conventional    theology    has    properly    under- 
stood the  New  Testament  writers  in  their  use  of 
this  phrase.    What  we  have  to  remember  here  is 
that   they   did   not   invent    their   religious    terms. 
They  used  those  that  were  already  in  vogue,  and 
in  the  sense  then  currently  received.     They  spoke 
of  the  Holy  Spirit  as  the  men  of   the  time  spoke. 
In   the   generation   to   which   Jesus   belonged   the 
Spirit  was  thought  of  not  as  an  independent  person- 
ality, but  as  the  power  of  God,  working  especially 
in    inspiration    and    inner    purification.     It    was 
common  amongst  the  Jews  of  the  time  to  speak 
in  this  sense  of  the  Holy  Spirit  or  the  "  Spirit  of 
God."    Nor  was  either  the  term  or  the  conception 
confined  to  the  Jews.     In  the  ancient  Persian  cult 
of  Mithras,   the  initiate,   after  performing  certain 
rites,  prays   "  that  I  through  the  Spirit  may  be 
born  again,  and  that  in  me,  purified  by  sacred  rite 
and  delivered  from  guilt,  the  Holy  Spirit  may  live 
and  move."    When,  therefore,  the  story  speaks  of 
the  gathered  people  as  "  being  filled  with  the  Holy 
Ghost,"  we  have  room  for  a  less  straitened,  a  less 


WHAT  WAS  PENTECOST  ?  63 

rigidly  restricted  interpretation  of  the  phrase  than 
theology  is  accustomed  to  give. 

Looking  into  our  narrative  in  this  modern  way, 
we  begin  to  get  an  idea  of  what  seems  to  have 
happened.  A  number  of  Jews,  who  had  been 
followers  of  Jesus,  at  one  of  their  public  meetings 
have  a  remarkable  spiritual  experience.  There~Ts 
a  great  ferment  of  souls,  accompanied  by  out- 
ward manifestations  not  dissimilar  to  those  of  a 
modern  revival.  The  excitement  amounted  to 
ecstasy,  and  there  was  a  confusion  which  led  the 
bystanders  to  think  the  people  affected  either 
drunk  or  crazy.  This,  be  it  noted,  was  the  more 
remarkable  since  the  Jews,  compared  with  other 
nations,  could  not  be  called  a  neurotic  or  emotional 
people.  There  are  races  whose  temperament  lends 
itself  easily  to  religious  frenzy.  The  Phrygians, 
from  whom  sprang  the  Montanist  sect  distinguished 
in  the  second  century  for  its  extravagant  enthusiasm, 
were  known  before  their  conversion  to  Christianity 
for  similar  excitements  in  the  worship  of  Cybele. 
To-day  the  Celt  shows  an  emotional  susceptibility 
which  is  foreign  to  the  Saxon.  But  the  Jew,  as  we 
have  said,  was  not  of  this  type,  The  New  Testament 
is  hardly  a  "  revivalist "  book.  It  would  be 
difficult,  indeed,  to  imagine  a  greater  contrast  than 
that  between  the  majestic  calm  of  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  and  the  wild  incoherencies  of  a  back- 
woods camp  meeting. 

If  anyone  suspects  the  genuineness  or  the  depth 
of  the  inner  movement  in  this  Jerusalem  meeting 
let  him  attend  to  what  follows.  Its  immediate 
effect  was  the  production  of  a  new  social  order. 


64          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

There  was  a  redistribution  of  property.  When 
we  reflect  on  the  tenacity  with  which  the  Israelite, 
from  father  Jacob  down  to  his  descendant  in 
Houndsditch,  holds  on  to  his  personal  belongings, 
we  arrive  at  some  sort  of  idea  of  the  force  which 
was  operating  on  these  minds  and  consciences  to 
compel  them  to  this  great  renunciation.  A  modern 
critic  makes  the  somewhat  cynical  observation 
that  the  Jerusalem  enthusiasm  which  gave  up 
everything,  so  impoverished  the  congregation  that 
they  were  obliged, ""as  Paul's  letters  show  us,  to 
sue  for  help  from  their  Gentile  brethren.  That  may 
be  so.  Their  communism  was  premature,  and  its 
first  form  did  not  subsist.  But  the  principle 
that  was  started  in  that  room,  under  the  influence 
of  this  primal  emotion — thejprinoiple  that  humanity 
is  a  family,  every  member  of  which  is  entitled  to  the 
household  love  and  succour — is  to-day  the  principle 
to  which  international  society  by  one  path  or 
another  is  everywhere  laboriously  pushing  its 
way. 

What,  then,  was  the  power  which,  working  on 
these  strong  self-contained  souls,  stirred  them 
so  mightily  ?  The  modern  psychologist,  arguing 
on  purely  natural  lines,  would  explain  it  as  a  kind 
of  "  burst  upwards  "  of  the  disciples'  subliminal 
consciousness.  They  had  been  living  and  brooding 
together,  possessed  with  one  idea,  the  tragic 
death  of  their  Master,  and  the  mysterious  events 
that  had  followed.  In  this  way  had  been  accumu- 
lated in  the  storehouse  of  their  emotional  nature 
quantities  of  combustible  material,  a  material  which 
in  the  excitement  of  the  Pentecost  gatherings  and 


WHAT  WAS  PENTECOST  ?  65 

of  this  special  meeting  had  reached  explosion  point. 
These  "  explosion  points  "  of  nations  and  societies 
are  continually  met  with  in  history.  They  are  a 
feature  of  the  human  evolution.  The  Renaissance, 
the  Reformation,  the  French  Revolution  are  illus- 
trations. There  is  in  each  case  a  long  hoarding  of 
material,  a  long  silent  work  of  the  human  sub- 
consciousness  upon  it ;  then  some  fact  or  circum-' 
stance  comes  as  torch  to  the  fuel,  and  all  goes  up 
in  thunder  and  flame. 

There  is  no  doubt  much  in  this  statement,  but 
it  is  incomplete.  In  human  spiritual  evolution, 
as  in  the  natural  evolution,  we  trace  the  operation 
of  the  eternal  laws.  But  law  here  is  not  every- 
thing. Before  law  can  work  it  must  have  some- 
thing to  work  upon.  'The  sun's  action  comes 
before  the  laws  of  the  sun's  action.-  Man's  move 
upwards  has  endless  natural  concomitants,  which 
we~can  more~or  less  distinctly  trace.  But"  behind  all 
that  is  ever'' the  mystery  of  the  power  that  moves 
him.  Pentecost  in  its  innermost  meaning  exhibits 
to  us  one  of  those  spiritual  overflows  which*mark 
every  stage  of  the  human  ascent.  But  high  tides 
and  overflows  represent  a  pull  somewhere  from 
an  outside  force.  The  sea  is  urged  by  the  njoon  ; 
the  soul's  wave-movement  has  also  its  lunar  laws. 
The  immense  human  response  of  Pentecost  was  in  pro- 
portion to  an  impulse  from  behind.  The  disciples 
personalised  that  energy.  Peter,  in  the  story, 
declares  that  the  power  poured  upon  them  was 
an  influence  diffused  by  their  crucified  Master 
from  His  place  in  the  Unseen.  Why  should  we 
not  accept  that  statement  ?  Philosophy,  which 

5 


66          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

only  a  short  while  ago  jeered  at  the  personal  in 
these  matters  as  a  mere  anthropomorphism,  is 
to-day  in  a  new  attitude.  It  finds  that  materialism 
is  just  an  anthropomorphic  as  is  the  New  Testa- 
ment, only  in  another  way.  Philosophy  has,  in 
fact,  to-day  no  valid  argument  against  the  doctrine 
that  the  spiritual  force  that  is  transforming  man 
is  a  personal  force. 

Can  we  repeat  Pentecost  ?  There  is  nothing 
more  doleful  than  attempts  at  spiritual  repetitions. 
The  soul  knows  its  hour  and  will  not  be  coerced. 
Moreover,  to  propose  to  repeat  a  thing  is  to  deny 
the  law  of  progress.  To-day  is  greater  than  yester- 
day. It  has  its  own  work  and  its  own  revelation. 
What  we  learn  from  Pentecost  is  not  to  hark  back  to 
the  old,  but  to  push  on  courageously  to  the  new. 
For  amongst  other  things  this  Jerusalem  event  was 
an  immense  break  with  the  past.  .It  inaugurated 
^revolution  At  bottom  it  meant  the  substitution 
of  jblie  religion  of  the  spirit  for  a  religion  of  form. 
We  are  only  at  the  beginning  as  yet  of  all  that  this 
meant.  For  to-day  we  are  carrying  this  evolution 
into  a  vaster  sphere.  Precisely  as  Pentecost 
meant  a  religion  which  transcended  Judaism,  so  the 
movement  now  going  on  means  a  religion  which 
transcends  mediae valism.  The  Christianity  we  have 
inherited  was  set  in^a  framework  which  is  visibly 
falling  to  pieces.  [Our  task  is  to  build  its  vital 
elements  into  a  new  and  larger  synthesis^)  The 
Jerusalem  Christians  in  their  Pentecost  message 
were  the  supreme  heretics  of  their  time.  All  the 
same  they  were  God's  appointed  workers.  The 
Power  which  moved  them  is  the  Power  which  in 


WHAT  WAS  PENTECOST  ?  67 

our  time  is  carrying  Church  and  world  into  another 
and  yet  higher  phase  of  thought  and  life. 

The  Jerusalem  Pentecost  drove  the  early  Church 
into  a  great  propaganda.  Our  Pentecost  will  in 
like  manner  have  its  propaganda.  It  will  carry 
with  it  all  the  spiritual  elements,  the  love,  the 
sympathy,  the  human  brotherliness  which  belonged 
to  that  first  phase.  But  it  will  take  with  it  some- 
thing more.  The  Church's  missionary  effort  is, 
before  our  eyes,  developing  an  entirely  new  element. 
We  cannot  better  describe  it,  or  complete  what  we 
have  here  had  to  say,  than  by  quoting  Professor 
Seeley  on  this  point  in  his  "  Natural  Religion." 
"  The  children  of  modern  civilisation  are  called 
to  follow  in  the  footsteps  of  Paul,  of  Gregory,  of 
Boniface,  of  Xavier,  Eliot  and  Livingstone.  But 
they  must  carry  not  merely  Christianity  in  its 
narrow  clerical  sense,  but  tl\pir  whnlp,  ma-ga  of 
spiritual  treasures  to  those  who  want  them.  Let  us 
carry  the  true  view  of  the  universe,  the  true  astro- 
nomy, the  true  chemistry  and  the  true  physiology 
to  polytheists  still  wrapped  in  mythological  dreams  ; 
let  us  carry  progress  and  freewill  to  fatalist  nations 
and  to  nations  cramped  by  the  fetters  of  primitive 
custom  ;  let  us  carry  the  doctrine  of  a  rational 
liberty  to  the  heart  of  Oriental  despotisms.  In 
doing  all  this.  .  .  we  shall  admit  the  outlying 
world  into  the  great  civilised  community,  into 
the  modern  city  of  God." 


The  Law  of  Change 

NOTHING  is  more  pathetic,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
more  singular,  than  the  persistence  with  which 
man  has  rebelled  against  the  primal  law  of  his  being, 
the  law  of  change.  The  words  he  loves  most  are 
those  which  express  the  opposite  of  change.  "  Firm,'' 
''  immovable,"  "  steadfast,"  "  eternal  "  are  his 
first-class  adjectives  ;  just  as  "  shifty,"  "  unstable," 
"  evanescent  "  are  at  the  bottom  of  his  value-scale. 
There  are  matters  here — questions,  anomalies — 
which  most  of  us  as  yet  have,  perhaps,  hardly 
puzzled  out,  and  which  it  may  be  profitable  to  in- 
vestigate. (_  Change,  we  say,  is  written  large  on 
life.  It  might  be  called  its  hall-mark/  The 
"  eternal  flux  "  was  the  watchword  of  one  of  the 
old  Greek  philosophies.  In  the  majestic,  melan- 
choly lines  of  Lucretius  there  is  no  thought  that 
more  often  recurs  : 

Nee  manet  ulla  sui  similis  res. 
Omnia  migrant. 

"  Nor  does  anything  abide  like  itself  ;  everything 
is  on  the  move."  We  realise  this  even  more  in- 
tensely now  than  did  the  ancients.  Science  gives 
us  a  universe  which  is  a  stupendous  dance  of  atoms  ; 

68 


69 

"  atomic  shivers,"  as  one  researcher  calls  them. 
We  live,  in  fact,  by  change.  Did  our  bodies  remain 
fixed  |from  one  moment  to  another  that  moment 
would  be  our  last.  In  this  rush  we  seem  to  keep 
nothing.  We  lose  our  children  as  much  by  living 
as  by  dying.  You  have  had  to  exchange  your 
two-year-old,  with  his  sweet,  engaging  ways,  for 
this  stur4y_schQoihay— who  is  another  affair  alto- 
gether. Men  think  of  deluges,  earthquakes,  revo- 
lutions— events  that  are  sudden  and  violent — as  the 
great  change-instruments.  But  at  the  world's 
quietest  the  movement  goes  on  not  less  surely 
than  in  its  great  uproars  and  upheavals.  Take 
the  story  of  a  London  street — Cheapside  or  Ludgate 
Hill.  For  nigh  two  thousand  years,  from  the  days 
of  old  Londmium  in  the  Roman  time,  there  has 
pulsed,  without  ceasing,  a  tide  of  life  along  these 
thoroughfares.  And  it  was  as  day  succeeded  day 
— silently,  imperceptibly,  as  the  crowd  moved  over 
the  pavements — that  there  crept  into  it  bit  by  bit 
all  the  changes,  in  raiment,  in  speech,  in  manners, 
in  ideas,  that  make  the  enormous  gulf  between  that 
far-off  time  and  our  own.  ^ 

We  ourselves  are  on  this  flood,  helpless  to  stay" 
its  movement.  We  may  stop  our  clocks,  but  not 
the  heart-beats  that  measure  our  days.  "  I  have 
seen,"  says  Montaigne,  "  the  green  shoot,  the 
flowers  and  the  fruit.  Now  I  see  '  la  secheresse.' 
I  see  it  happily  because  it  is  natural."  Undoubtedly 
the  best  way  to  see  it.  But  the  "  natural  "  here 
will  become  still  more  welcome  to  us  when  we 
enter  more  deeply  into  what  is  contained  in  it. 
For  now  we  discover  that  the  change-flood  which 


70  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

sweeps  us  along  is  not  master  in  the  universe.  It 
has  its  limits  and  Its"  laws.  Its  limits  to  begin 
with.  For  it  seems  set  here  as  the  antithesis  of 
something  greater,  older  than  itself — namely,  the 
permanent.  Change,  we  find,  is  an  affair  of  the 
surface  of  things  ;  it  is  of  the  outer  rind  of  reality, 
not  of  its  innermost  core.  It  belongs  to  that  order 
of  phenomena  with  which  science  has  to  do.  But 
science,  to  use  the  words  of  Wundt,  one  of  her 
most  eminent  students,  "  indicates  the  path  to 
territories  beyond  her  own,  ruled  by  other  laws 
than  those  to  which  her  realm  is  subject."  Philo- 
sophy, which  underlies  science,  shows  us  thatrwe 
could,  in  fact,  have  no  idea  of  change  apart  from 
'  the  concept  of  a  permanent)  It  shows  us,  in  that 
thought-world  which  for  us  is  the  greatest  of  all 
realities,  how  the  sweep  and  movement  of  the 
evanescent  obtains  all  its  strange  effect  upon  us 
by  contrast  with  a  something  within  which  tells 
of  fixity,  of  eternity.  Our  thought-world  is  as 
full  of  the  changeless  as  the  material  world  is  of 
change.  Here  we  find  laws — of  mathematics,  of 
logic,  of  the  inherent  relations  of  things,  which, 
amid  all  outward  permutations,  remain  the  same. 
The  truths  of  geometry,  of  thought  sequence,  of 
harmony,  are  more  solid  than  the  hills.  The 
whole  sphere  of  the  invisible,  hi  short,  is  a  sphere 
^  of  the  eternal. 

Change,  we  see,  has  its  limits.  It  has  also  its 
laws.  There  is,  we  find,  .an  invisible  wrapped 
around  every  visible,  and  it  is  this  invisible  that 
is  permanent.  We  transmute  our  products  by 
chemical  processes  ;  but  we  can  never  change  the 


THE  LAW  OF  CHANGE  71 

law  of  the  processes.  We  can  combine  our  oxygen 
and  hydrogen,  but  we  have  no  power  over  the 
combining  proportions,  t  Nature,  so  prodigal  of 
her  mutations,  is  also  the  greatest  of  conservatives. 
How  she  keeps  to  her  forms  !  Why  is  it  that 
carbon  when  it  crystallises  into  diamond  invariably 
assumes  some  form  derived  from  the  cube,  while 
quartz  will  as  invariably  take  the  shape  of  a  six- 
sided  prism)  The  same  metal  goes  on  eternally 
yielding  tlie  same  spectrum.  Indeed,  there  is  an 
aspect  in  which  we  might  speak  almost  of  the 
monotony  of  nature.  Plus  ca  change,  plus  c'est  la 
meme  chose.  It  is  this  aspect  which  certain  pessi- 
mists have  seized  on  as  a  ground  for  their  grumble 
at  the  universe.  Marcus  Aurelius  complains  that 
"  things  are  repeated  and  come  over  again  apace." 
Goethe  tells  of  a  contemporary  who  disliked  the  ) 
ever-returning  green  of  spring  and  wished  that  L 
"  by  way  of  change  it  might  once  appear  red." 
Schopenhauer  likens  life  to  a  conjurer's  booth ; 
where  the  tricks  are  made  to  be  seen  only  once. 
If  you  live  through  two  generations  you  see  them 
twice  over  and  their  effect  is  gone.  Spinoza  has 
erected  this  sameness  into  a  philosophy,  and  offers 
us  a  universe  which,  being  eternally  perfect  in 
itself,  can  as  such  make  no  progress,  any  more 
than  a  circle  can  ever  be  more  a  circle  than  it  is. 
This  brings  us  to  the  real  point  of  our  discussion. 
Spinoza  has  had  a  new  vogue  of  late,  and  there  is 
a  certain  order  of  mind  for  whom  he  will  always 
have  a  great  fascination.  Always,  indeed,  he  will 
stand  amongst  the  noblest  and  purest  of  spirits,  and 
his  system  for  one  of  the  most  wonderful  of  intel- 


72  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

lectual  creations.  But  humanity  is  wiser  than  the 
wisest  of  its  sons,  and  it  is  outgrowing  Spinoza. 
We  see  to-day  that  his  geometrical  demonstrations 
are  misplaced  as  applied  to  the  mystery  of  the 
universal  life.  Mathematics  go  deep  into  the  cosmos, 
but  they  do  not  contain  the  whole  of  it.  His  denial 
of  ends,  and  of  final  causes,  is  an  a  priori  assump- 
tion which  the  facts,  as  we  now  know  them,  do 
not  bear  out.  He  wrote  before  the  key  of  evo- 
lution had  been  discovered,  the  key  which  has 
unlocked  so  many  secret  chambers  and  opened 
so  many  new  perspectives.  In  particular  it  opened 
a  view  unknown  to  him,  of  vastest  significance 
both  for  science,  philosophy  and  religion.  It  is 
that  of  infinite  progression.  It  gives  us,  in  short, 
the  essential  law  of  change,  in  which  we  see  that 
change  is  ever  in  the  long  run  a  change  upward. 

Spinoza  says  the  universe  is  perfect.  Its  per- 
fection is  in  itself.  There  is  nothing  else  than  it. 
God  is  the  universe  and  the  universe  is  God.  It 
is  the  sum  of  all  there  is,  and  you  cannot  have 
more  than  there  is.  But  what  are  the  facts,  so  far 
as  we  can  now  see  ?  Do  they  not  reveal  to  us, 
rather,  a  universe  that  is  not  so  much  perfect  as 
perfecting  ?  We  see  everywhere  movement,  and  a 
movement  one  way.  Science  points  us  to  a  life- 
series  which  has  always  been  mounting  the  ladder, 
from  zoophyte  to  man.  Nature  in  this  showing 
does  not  repeat  herself,  but  to  the  old  adds  ever 
her  something  new.  The  history  of  civilisation  is 
the  repetition  on  another  scale  of  the  zoologic 
story.  Man  has  not  only  moved  ;  he  has  climbed. 
His  ideas,  his  morality,  his  religions,  have  shown 


THE  LAW  OF  CHANGE  73 

ever  the  fresh  increment.  He  has  not  repeated 
simply  what  he  had.  The  later  generations  show 
an  accretion,  an  importation  of  what  the  earlier 
did  not  possess.  The  most  striking  feature  in 
to-day's  religious  thought  is  that  men  are  bewil- 
dered by  their  own  upward  movement.  They  are 
distressed  to  find  a  something  in  themselves  to 
which  their  sacred  books,  their  religious  traditions 
do  not  properly  respond.  They  are  unable  to  see 
what,  nevertheless,  is  the  plainest  of  truths,  that 
they,  because  they  stand  farther  on  in  the  move- 
ment, are  the  recipients  of  an  inspiration  which  is 
higher  than  the  older  and  written  one,  and  by 
which  the  older  is  being  judged. 

But  what  does  all  this  point  to  ?  Surely  to  a 
cosmic  view  which  neither  philosophy  nor  religion 
has  as  yet  fairly  discussed,  but  which  they  will 
have  to  discuss.  Science  and  philosophy  run 
after  Monism  to-day,  but  the  signs  are  that  when 
all  is  done  they  will  end  in  Dualism.  The  signs  are, 
that  is,  of  an  external  universe  which  is  not  per- 
fected, but  on  the  way  to  perfection.  Which  in  its 
turn  means  a  Perfect  of  Being  and  Reality  that  is 
behind  and  beyond  the  visible  universe,  greater 
than  it,  and  which,  in  its  constant  self -disclosures, 
brings  ever  the  cosmos  closer  to  its  own  height 
and  beauty.  Why  should  we  think  of  the  universe 
other  than  as  we  think  of  ourselves  ?  Why  should 
we  not  say  that,  just  as  the  soul  in  us  is  in  a  way 
a  mirror  of  the  Deity,  but  an  imperfect  one  ;  and 
that  in  proportion  as  the  soul  grows,  in  that  degree 
the  Divinity  is  more  clearly  revealed ;  so  this 
external  frame  of  things  is  just  a  vehicle  for  the 


74  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

self -disclosure  of  God,  and  will,  in  its  infinite  pro- 
gression, open  to  us  ever  more  of  the  inexhaustible 
riches  of  His  perfection  ? 

It  is,  we  say,  to  some  such  point  as  this  that 
the  higher  science  and  the  higher  philosophy  of 
to-day  are  steadily  moving.  And  the  lesson  from 
it  is  that  which  religion  has  taught  from  the  begin- 
ning, the  lesson,  namely,  of^our  inheritance  in  the 
Invisible,  of  our  permanent  home  and  treasure 
there.)  What  is  seen  has  all  come  out  of  the  un- 
J  seen,  is  a  sort  of  deposit  from  it,  and  there  is  an 
infinity  more  to  follow.  But  our  share  is  in  the 
fountain  as  well  as  in  the  stream.  We  are  not 
of  the  visible  only  ;  our  inmost  texture  is  of  the 
invisible,  and  we  partake  of  its  eternity. 

Kein  Wesen  kann  zu  nichts  zerfallen, 
Das  Ewige  regt  sich  fort  in  alien. 

"  No  being  can  to  nothing  fall,  in  everything  the 
Eternal  moves."  So  sings  the  German  prophet. 
But  we  can  go  further.  Science  and  philosophy 
take  us  to  the  threshold  ;  the  Christian  Gospel 
introduces  us  to  the  presence  chamber.  These 
suggest  a  power,  a  wisdom,  greater  than  all  we 
see  ;  this  tells  us  of  a  love  that  passeth  knowledge. 
Spinoza  offers  us  the  Amor  intellectualis  Dei  : 
Jesus  shows  us  the  heart  of  the  Father,  and  that, 
and  that  alone,  suffices  us. 


VI 
Religion    and    Crime 

THE  other  day,  passing  up  Ludgate  Hill  the 
present  writer  saw  a  thief  taken  in  the  act.  There 
was  a  sudden  rush  ;  half  a  dozen  hands  held  the 
struggling  wretch  until  a  policeman,  appearing  at 
the  nick  of  time,  took  over  the  capture.  "  Got  it 
in  his  hand,  has  he  ?  "  said  the  grinning  officer,  as, 
seizing  the  culprit  by  the  collar,  he  marched  away 
with  him,  followed  by  the  crowd.  "  He's  got 
pinched,"  said  an  urchin  to  a  group  of  companions, ' 
who  entered  heartily  into  the  jest.  Everybody 
seemed  interested.  The  incident  was  a  relief  to 
the  monotony  of  the  day.  Meanwhile  the  indi- 
vidual who  formed  the  centre  of  it  all  was  clearly 
not  enjoying  himself.  He  was  a  type  of  the  London 
vaurien — of  its  lowest  class,  undersized,  with  bent 
shoulders,  squalid  ;  hunger  and  despair  looking  out 
of  his  eyes.  The  most  astonishing  part  of  the  affair, 
to  one  onlooker  at  least,  was  the  perfect  ease  with 
which  it  seemed  to  fall  into  a  pre-arranged  system 
of  things.  Everything  and  everybody  appeared 
to  be  ready  for  that  thief.  The  British  Constitu- 
tion, the  law  court,  the  magistrate,  the  policeman, 
thejprison,^were  all  waiting  for  him.  They  were 

75 


76          RELIGION  AND. EXPERIENCE 

there  in  anticipation  of  his  procedures  ;  he  performed 
his  share  in  a  business,  every  detail  of  which  had 
been  previously  thought  out.  The  catching  and 
immurement  of  thieves,  is  not  that  a  feature  of 
civilisation  ?  Society  knows  exactly  the  part  it 
has  to  play.  "Three  months' hard,"  endured  by 
the  prisoner  and  paid  for  by  the  nation,  will  per- 
fectly settle  the  account. 

But  is  the  account  settled  ?  Have  we  done  with 
our  criminal  when  we  have  caught  and  gaoled  him  ? 
It  may  after  all  appear  that  this  is  the  beginning 
rather  than  the  end  of  the  matter.  We  have,  let 
us  remember,  a  criminal  class  in  London  alone 
equal  to  the  population  of  a  large  town.  Has 
society  done  its  part  towards  these  teeming  thou- 
sands when  it  has  erected  its  palace  of  justice, 
increased  the  cell  accommodation  of  Portland,  and 
made  new  appointments  to  the  magistracy  ?  Or  is 
'it  not  time  to  reconsider  this  whole  business  of 
crime  and  the  criminal,  and  to  realise  that,  wrapped 
up  in  this  one  question,  is  the  whole  problem  of 
life,  of  religion,  and  of  the  social  pact  ? 

Thought  on  these  matters  is  moving  swiftly  in 
our  day.  We  have  got  a  long  way,  for  instance, 
from  the  Carlyle  attitude.  His  recipe,  in  the 
"  Latter  Day  Pamphlets,"  of  "a  hearty  hatred 
for  scoundrels  "  ;  his  sneer  at  the  notion  of  "  drilling 
twelve  hundred  scoundrels  by  methods  of  kind- 
ness " ;  his  gibe  at  the  philanthropic  treatment 
as  that  of  a  crew  which,  having  lost  its  way  round 
Cape  Horn,  instead  of  taking  to  their  sextants 
and  asking  about  the  laws  of  wind  and  water, 
and  of  earth  and  heaven,  are  serving  out  to  the 


RELIGION  AND  CRIME  77 

worthy   and   unworthy   alike   a   double   allowance 
of  grog  "  ;  all  this  has  become  clean  out  of  date. 
It   is   precisely   because   society   has   been   asking 
about  "  the  laws  of  heaven  and  earth  "  that  "  the 
hating  of  scoundrels,"   and  the  mere  hanging  of 
them,  as  the  final  word,  have  become  impossible. 
The  Carlylean  method  pays  no  attention  to  facts 
of  human  nature  and  of  society  which  we  have 
now  become  fully  aware  of.     It  takes  the  criminal 
there  as  he  is,  but  asks  no  question  as  to  how 
he  came  to  be  what  he  is,  or  as  to  what  other  thing 
than    this    he    may    become.     It    regards    society 
always   as   the   judge,   and   never   inquires   as   to 
whether,  in  the  balance  between  these  two,  society 
itself  may  not  sometimes  be  the  greater  criminal. 
It  is  dawning  upon  us  that  in  this  department 
of  life  a  huge  mistake  has  been  made,  a  mistake 
centuries  old,  closely  allied  with  other  great  mistakes 
that  it  is  now  more  than  time  we  set  to  work  to 
rectify.     In  exploring  this  region  we  find  ourselves 
brought    inevitably    into    contact    with    religion. 
Religion  has  all  along  been  a  governing  factor  in  the 
treatment  of  criminals,   and  will  continue  to  be. 
But  its  record  is  a  strangely  mixed  one.     It  is  to 
religion   we    must   look   for   the   purifying    forces 
which  will  cleanse  this  dark  corner  of  life.    At  the 
same  time  it  has  to  be  said  that  to  false  views  of 
religion  an  enormous  amount  of  the  mischief  done 
in  it  is  plainly  due.     The  most  fatal  thing  in  theo- 
logy  has    been   its    notion,    diligently   taught   for 
centuries,  that  punishment  was  an  end  in  itself  ; 
that  God's  way  with  wrongdoers  was  to  torture 
them  for  ever.     Mediaeval  doctrine  and  its  survivals 


78  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

have  here  certainly  not  been  complimentary  to 
Deity.  The  Churches  who  held  it  worshipped  God, 
but  assuredly  they  did  not  trust  Him.  Instead, 
they  warned  men  against  Him  ;  they  warned 
them  of  what  He  might  do  to  them,  of  what  horrors 
He  was  capable  of  inflicting  on  them.  And  it 
was  of  an  equal  barbarity  they  convicted  Him  in 
their  suggested  methods  of  placation.  They  could 
get  round  Him,  it  was  suggested,  by  substitu- 
tions and  sacrifices.  Even  the  ancients  knew 
better  than  this.  Plato,  in  the  "  Laws,"  says  there 
were  three  suppositions  about  the  gods  on  which 
evil-doers  rested  their  hopes — that  they  did  not 
exist,  or  that  they  did  not  care  for  man,  or  that  they 
might  be  easily  appeased  by  sacrifices.  And  Ovid, 
in  the  "  Fasti,"  has  a  cutting  remark  on  ceremonial 
salvation  : 

Ah,  nimium  faciles,   qui  tristia  crimina  caedis 
Fluminea  tolli  posse  putetis  aqua. 

("  Too  easy-going  are  you  who  imagine  that  flowing 
water  can  carry  away  the  sad  crimes  of  blood.") 
How  much  nobler  and  nearer  the  fact  than  all  this 
priestly  juggling,  the  view  which  Plutarch  maintains, 
that  punishment  does  not  so  much  follow  upon 
wrong-doing  as  that  it  is  contemporaneous  with 
and  inherent  in  it ! 

The  false  view  of  God  and  His  ways  fostered 
by  the  Latin  Church  (for  it  was  never  held  by  the 
Greek  fathers)  reacted  with  fatal  effect  upon  the 
authorities  both  of  Church  and  State.  If  God 
punished  for  punishment's  sake  so  might  man. 
The  hell  which  flamed  in  the  next  world  must  have 


RELIGION  AND  CRIME  79 

its  counterpart  in  this.  The  priest  was  here  more 
cruel  than  the  layman,  and  the  survival  of  this 
feeling  is  to  be  noted  in  later  history.  One  of  the 
darkest  blots  on  the  Church,  down  almost  to  our 
own  day,  has  been  its  full  acquiescence  in  the  worst 
features  of  our  criminal  law,  and  its  resistance 
to  any  amelioration.  The  strongest  defenders  of 
the  savagery  of  the  English  code,  of  its  death  sen- 
tences for  sheep  stealing  and  similar  offences,  were 
the  Anglican  bishops.  And  the  outside  churches 
were  not  much  better.  In  the  "  Heart  of  Mid- 
lothian "  Scott  tells  us  how,  in  Edinburgh, 
"  criminals  under  sentence  of  death  were  brought 
to  the  Tolbooth  Church  to  hear  and  join  in  public 
worship  on  the  Sabbath  before  execution."  The 
clergyman,  on  the  occasion  he  describes  (and  he  is 
here  reciting  history),  "  preached  an  affecting 
discourse."  Doubtless.  They  were  good  at  that. 
And  so  far  as  one  can  see  they  would  have  gone 
on  preaching  "  affecting  discourses  "  to  condemned 
sheep-stealers  and  smugglers  for  ever,  without 
ever  asking  about  the  ethics  of  the  condemnation. 
But  a  mighty  change  has  come  over  the  public 
mind.  We  think  differently  to-day  about  both 
man  and  God,  and  the  new  thought  is  filtering 
rapidly  down  into  our  whole  theory  and.  practice 
of  law  and  of  punishment.  On  this  theme  science 
has,  by  the  sheer  accumulation  of  facts,  cleared 
away  a  whole  cloud  of  ecclesiastical  misconceptions. 
It  has  shown  us  that  human  nature,  in  its  worst 
criminal  forms,  is  simply  good  stuff  badly  handled. 
Man  is  the  greatest  force  we  know,  and  he  requires 
careful  management.  People  who  deal  with  dyna- 


80  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

mite  the  wrong  way  will  get  a  bad  opinion  of  it — 
those  who  are  left  of  them.  And  your  human  is 
mightier  than  dynamite.  Now  the  human  force 
means  well  where  it  gets  a  chance.  When  Lord 
Palmerston  startled  the  orthodoxy  of  his  day  by 
declaring  in  the  House  of  Commons  that  "  all 
men  are  born  good,"  he  was  only  repeating  what 
Plato  and  Clement  of  Alexandria  had  said  centuries 
before  him.  Innumerable  experiments  have  shown 
that,  taken  at  its  worst,  where  knowledge  and 
sympathy  have  been  brought  to  bear  upon  it,  the 
material  is  good.  Our  human  wreckage,  like  other 
waste  products,  can  be  made  profitable  when 
scientifically  treated.  In  the  "  Creevey  Papers  " 
it  is  recorded  how  Lord  and  Lady  Duncannon, 
in  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century,  by 
three  years'  work  on  their  estate  and  town  of 
Peltown,  in  Ireland,  brought  the  population  to  a 
condition  unsurpassed  in  order,  comfort  and 
civilisation.  "  And  yet  it  was  only  four  miles 
from  Carrick,  one  of  the  most  lawless  towns 
in  Tipperary."  That  is  only  one  of  a  thousand 
similar  testimonies  that  might  be  cited.  Dr. 
Barnardo  showed  how  the  riff-raff  of  the  London 
gutters,  taken  out  of  its  evil  surroundings  and 
translated  to  a  proper  environment,  could  be 
turned  into  good  citizens.  No  fact,  in  short,  is 
better  established  than  that  of  the  human  recover- 
ability.  Jesus  taught  this,  though  His  Church 
forgot  it.  It  was  this  knowledge  which  sent  Him 
over  to  the  outcast  and  the  lost. 

But    this    opens    to    us    another    consideration. 
Society  hitherto  has  been  busy  indicting  the  criminal. 


RELIGION  AND  CRIME  81 

It  has  called  him  all  the  bad  names  of  its  vocabulary. 
It  has  caught  him,  judged  him,  prisoned  him ; 
and  our  Chelsea  philosopher  winds  up  by  recom- 
mending a  wholesale  shooting  and  hanging  of  him. 
We  are  now,  however,  beginning  dimly  to  perceive 
another  side  to  all  this,  and  are  asking  uneasily 
whether  Society,  of  which  we  are  a  part,  is  not  on 
the  whole  the  greater  criminal ;  and  whether,  if 
any  shooting  or  hanging  is  to  be  done,  it  were  not 
better  to  begin  nearer  home  ?  Society,  we  perceive, 
has  blundered  villainously  in  two  ways  ;  first  in 
making  the  criminal,  and  second  in  doing  the  worst 
with  him  when  made.  There  needs  to  be  a  redis- 
tribution of  blame,  and  also  of  correction. 

Where,  to  begin  with,  has  the  criminal  come 
from  ?  How  did  he  come  to  be  what  he  is  ?  Would 
our  Ludgate  Hill  wretch,  lugged  by  the  grinning 
policeman  to  the  lock-up,  choose  this  lot,  as  com- 
pared for  instance  with  that  of  the  sleek,  well-fed, 
well-pursed  bystanders  who  looked  on  ?  Who 
chose  it  for  him  ?  What  of  the  system  which  has 
allowed  a  fellow  mortal  to  sink  to  this  depth  ? 
But  we  are  the  makers  and  supporters  of  the 
system.  Do  not  the  words  of  Maeterlinck  here 
burn  the  skin  of  every  one  of  us  ?  "  For  it  is 
enough  that  we  should  feel  the  cold  a  little  less 
than  the  labourer  who  passes  by,  that  we  should 
be  better  fed  or  clad  than  he,  that  we  should  buy 
any  object  that  is  not  strictly  indispensable,  and 
we  have  unconsciously  returned,  through  a  thou- 
sand byways,  to  the  ruthless  act  of  primitive  man 
despoiling  his  weaker  brother."  Here  speaks  that 
social  conscience  outside  the  Church  which,  in 

6 


82  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

these  matters,  is  nearer  the  Christianity  of  Christ 
than  the  modern  Church  itself.  The  earlier  Church 
was  bolder.  In  teaching  that  the  goods  of  the 
world  are  not  properly  partitioned,  that  poverty 
and  crime  are  an  indictment  not  so  much  of  the 
poor  and  the  criminal  as  of  the  rich,  the  Socialist 
of  to-day  is  only  saying  what  Chrysostom  and 
Basil  and  Jerome  and  Tertullian  said  ages  ago. 

Initial  robberies  on  the  vastest  scale  depriving 
the  people  of  their  land  and  liberties,  and  forcing 
them  to  herd  in  the  amorphous  masses  of  the  cities, 
have  been  one  cause  of  the  creation  of  the  criminal 
classes.  Another  cause  has  been  our  stupidity  and 
neglect.  We  are  a  wonderful  people,  we  English  ! 
We  are  spending  millions  of  money  on  the  education 
of  children  between  the  ages  of  five  and  thirteen. 
To  give  them  during  those  years  the  proper  brand 
of  theology  we  fight  like  tigers,  turn  out  Govern- 
ments, become  Passive  Resisters  and  what  not.  And 
when  our  child  has  reached  thirteen  ;  when,  that 
is  to  say,  he  has  entered  upon  his  most  critical  and 
dangerous  age,  we  forget  all  about  him  !  He  is 
free  then  to  go  to  the  devil  by  whatsoever  quickest 
way  he  can  find  ! 

Thus  we  make  our  criminals.  When  made,  we 
immure  them  in  gaols,  clothe  them  in  a  hideous 
garb,  set  them  up,  as  poor  Oscar  Wilde  said,  as 
"  the  zanies  of  sorrow,  clowns  whose  hearts  are 
broken."  We  fix  on  them  an  indelible  brand,  and 
carefully  shut  out  from  them  the  means  of  return  to 
an  honest  life.  What  barbarism  it  all  is  !  And 
this  in  a  day  when  no  serious  sociologist  any  longer 
believes  in  fear  or  pain  as  agencies  in  the  reformation 


RELIGION  AND  CRIME-  83 

of  character.  Nearly  four  centuries  ago  More  in 
his  "  Utopia  "  taught  that  punishment  should  have 
as  its  only  end  the  destruction  of  vices  and  the 
saving  of  men.  It  is  time  we  had  learned  that  lesson. 
Let  us  sum  up,  in  terms  that  may  be  easily 
remembered,  the  gist  of  what  has  been  here  ad- 
vanced. Crime  is  a  disease,  and  one  that  is  every- 
where curable.  The  existence  of  a  criminal  class 
is  an  indictment,  not  of  that  class  specially,  but  of 
Society  at  large,  whose  greed  and  neglect  have 
produced  it.  Every  time  a  man  enters  the  dock 
Society  enters  with  him  as  particeps  criminis. 
And,  finally,  the  only  way  of  curing  our  criminal  is 
not  by  the  infliction  of  pain,  but  by  Christ's  way 
of  Divine  sympathy,  by  standing  in  with  him  as  a 
brother,  by  using  our  skill  to  fight  his  inner  ailment, 
by  changing  his  environment,  by  bringing  in  our 
goodwill  to  assist  his  diseased  will ;  in  a  word,  by 
giving  his  better  self  a  chance. 


VII 
Pleasure 

WHATEVER  he  is  doing  man  i8  always  the  most 
interesting  of  studies.  He  is  never  more  so  than 
when  "  taking  his  pleasure."  Often  enough  it  is  a 
sufficiently  frivolous  business  in  itself,  yet  nowhere 
than  here  are  the  heights  and  deeps  of  humanity, 
its  weird  problems,  its  endless  vistas  of  possibility 
more  strikingly  displayed.  At  the  outset  a  most 
singular  question  confronts  us.  How  is  it  that 
pleasure  has  obtained  so  ill  a  name  ?  The  word 
lies  under  a  religious  ban.  It  has  become  one  of 
the  most  sinister  and  equivocal  in  the  dictionary. 
To  call  any  one  "  a  man  of  pleasure  "  is,  in  most 
circles,  to  suggest  the  worst.  In  hymns,  sermons, 
devotions,  the  soul  is  warned  against  pleasure  as 
one  of  its  chief  dangers.  What  does  it  mean  ? 

For  when,  putting  aside  all  prepossessions,  we 
come  to  examine  the  matter  for  ourselves,  we  find 
Nature  offering  this  banned  product  as  her  master- 
piece, as  her  chief  good.  To  that  glow,  that  over- 
flow of  sensation  which  we  know  as  a  sense  of 
pleasure,  the  whole  machinery  of  life,  at  its  best 
and  highest,  has  contributed.  It  is  only  in  the 
harmony  of  all  Nature's  powers,  in  the  delicate 

84 


PLEASURE  86 

adjustment  of  a  million"" co-operators  within  and 
without  us,  that  this  result  is  achieved.  So  won- 
drous delicate,  is,  indeed,  the  process,  that  it  is 
never  kept  up  for  long  at  its  first  pitch.  The 
pleasure  of  a  walk,  of  a  piece  of  noble  scenery,  of 
listening  to  great  music,  is  never  a  fixed  quantity. 
At  the  end  one  is  sensible  of  fatigue,  of  strain, 
perhaps  of  vacuity.  It  is  the  earlier  moments  that 
give  us  the  high  rapture.  Life  seems  then  to 
exhale  a  delicate  perfume,  to  offer  a  flavour  which 
dissipates,  almost  ere  it  is  fully  recognised.  To 
taste  it  again  we  must  wait  till  another  drop  of 
that  subtlest  of  essences  has  once  more  collected 
within  us. 

But  this  supreme  product  of  Nature,  this  result 
of  what  seem  her  highest  and  healthiest  states  is, 
as  we  have  said,  placed  under  a  ban,  made  the  object 
of  a  thousand  warnings.  "  This  vain  world's 
pleasure  "  is  the  refrain  of  our  hymns.  Pascal, 
one  of  the  greatest  of  human  spirits,  made  it  one 
of  his  maxims  "  to  renounce  every  pleasure." 
Bernard  of  Clairvaux  speaks  of  himself  and  his  asso- 
ciates as  having  "  rejected  as  filth  all  that  shines 
bright  or  sounds  sweet  to  the  ear."  St.  John  of 
the  Cross  made  it  his  rule  to  renounce  all  that  was 
agreeable  to  the  senses  and  to  embrace  all  that 
was  repulsive.  How  has  this  come  about  ?  The 
answer  is  given  in  the  wondrous  story,  not  by  any 
means  ended  yet,  of  the  human  soul. 

The  story  is  in  many  parts.  The  education  of 
the  soul  in  relation  to  pleasure  has  been  conducted 
not  only  by  religion,  but  in  an  important  degree 
by  philosophy.  We  may  spend  a  moment  here 


86  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

in  inquiring  as  to  its  verdict,    Ancient  Greece  and 
modern  Germany  have  given  us  much  that  is  illu- 
minating on  our  subject,  but  nowhere,  as  Voltaire 
in  his  day  acknowledged,  has  the  moral  question 
here  been  discussed  with  more  depth  and  vigour, 
or  with  a  clearer  grasp  of  the  issues  involved,  than 
in    England.    By    Hobbes    and    Shaftesbury    and 
Hutcheson,  by  Hume  and  Hartley,  by  Tucker  and 
Paley  of  the  earlier  time,  and  by  Bentham  and 
Spencer,  by  Sedgwick  and  Martineau  and  Green  in 
the   later   day,   almost   everything   has   been   said 
that  can  be  said.     Some  of  these  wage  war  without 
quarter  against  the  ascetic  position.     To  Abraham 
Tucker,   to   Bentham   and   to   Paley   happiness   is 
simply   the   sum   of  pleasures.     Pleasure,   without 
qualification,   is   the   chief   good.     Hartley,   in  his 
"  Observations   on  Man,"   improves   on   this  with 
his  division  of  pleasures  into  those  of  gross  self- 
interest,    of   refined   self-interest,    and   of   rational 
self-interest.     But  it  was  Hutcheson,  in  his  "  In- 
quiry Concerning  Moral  Good  and  Evil  "  and  his 
"  Essay  on  the  Nature  and  Conduct  of  the  Passions 
and  Affections,"   who   first   developed   into   clear- 
ness the  principle  of  the  absolute  difference  in  the 
quality  and  value  of  pleasures.     It  is  from   this 
starting-point  that  we  are  able  to  reduce  the  earlier 
chaos  of  opinion  to  harmony.     It  is  in  the  light 
of  his  principle  that  we  discover  the  real  meaning 
of  renunciation,  and  that  the  ascetics  were  not  in 
such  discord  with  nature  as  at  first  seemed.     When 
he  declares  that   "  we  have  an  immediate  sense 
of  a  dignity,  a  perfection,  or  beatific  quality  in 
some  kinds  of  pleasure  which  no  intenseness  of  the 


PLEASURE  87 

lower  kinds  may  equal,"  we  feel  ourselves  at  once 
at  the  key  of  the  position. 

What  we  have  learned  since  Hutcheson's  day  is 
all  a  confirmation  of  his  teaching.  Evolution, 
properly  understood,  shows  us  the  way  along  which, 
on  this  question,  science,  philosophy  and  religion 
reach  their  reconciliation.  It  shows  us,  to  begin 
with,  pleasure  as  unquestionably  a  good.  On  all 
its  planes  it  is  a  harmony,  an  achievement,  a  nature's 
triumph.  Its  varying  forms,  of  lower  and  higher, 
represent  the  marvellous  story  of  man's  growth. 
Nature  here  is  as  a  great  musician,  who  begins 
his  composition  with  a  simple  air,  which  as  it  pro- 
ceeds is  incessantly  repeated,  but  ever  with  a  fresh 
note,  a  new  element  brought  in,  until  what  at  first 
was  the  barest  musical  thread  has  been  woven  into 
the  most  elaborate  and  complicated  harmony. 

That  pleasure  is  an  integral  part,  and  a  final 
end  in  the  scheme  of  things,  is  a  conclusion  which 
it  is  impossible  to  escape.  The  lack  of  it  is  in 
itself  a  sign  of  unhealth,  of  an  unnatural  condition. 
Every  element  is  charged  with  pleasure,  every 
action  yields  it.  To  eat,  to  drink,  to  work,  to 
rest,  to  sleep,  to  awake,  to  listen,  to  converse,  to 
hear,  to  see — all  is,  to  a  wholesome  nature,  to 
enjoy.  Sir  James  Paget,  arguing  from  the  whole 
analogy  of  things,  maintained  that  dying,  as  a 
natural  act,  contained  its  own  pleasure.  The  oppo- 
site of  it — that  is,  pain,  discomfort — is  a  signal  of 
danger,  of  a  breach  in  the  constitutional  order. 
The  most  unlikely  things,  properly  treated,  yield 
their  pleasure.  The  anatomist  finds  delight  in  a 
skeleton.  Nature  is  continually  hoarding  her 


88  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE. 

delights  for  us,  and  making  them,  like  old  wine, 
the  more  valuable  for  the  keeping.  It  has  taken  a 
million  years  to  ripen  the  exact  sensation  with 
which  a  geologist  breaks  open  his  stone  and  finds 
his  fossil  within.  And  as  with  things,  so  with 
circumstances.  Renan  is  assuredly  right  in  his 
observation  that  "  everything  considered,  there 
are  few  situations  in  the  vast  field  of  existence 
wherein  the  balance  of  debt  and  credit  does  not 
leave  a  little  surplus  of  happiness."  Were  it  other- 
wise men  would  not  cling  to  life  as  they  do.  John- 
son, in  his  last  days,  swollen  with  dropsy  and 
choked  with  asthma,  would,  he  declared,  have 
given  one  of  his  legs  for  another  year  of  life.  Poor 
Dodd,  condemned  to  be  hanged,  when  told 
by  pious  friends  as  a  consolation  that  he  was  going 
to  leave  a  wretched  world,  would  not  join  in  the 
cant.  "  No,  no,"  said  he  ;  "it  has  been  a  very 
agreeable  world  to  me." 

How  comes  it,  then,  that,  with  all  this  before 
us,  we  have  that  note  from  religion  ;  that  there 
rises  in  us  the  scorn  for  the  mere  man  of  pleasure  ; 
that  we  revolt  against  the  whole  hedonist  theory 
of  living  ?  Are  we  right  in  our  disgust  for  Lord 
Chesterfield  when  he  writes  to  his  son — a  natural 
son,  by  the  way — exhorting  him  to  pursue  pleasure 
as  "  the  last  branch  of  his  education  "  ?  Should 
we  approve  Madame  du  Chatelet,  Voltaire's  mis- 
tress, in  her  assertion  that  "  we  have  nothing  else 
to  do  in  the  world  than  to  obtain  agreeable  sen- 
sations and  sentiments  "  ?  Has  De  Chaulieu  uttered 
the  final  word  in  declaring  that  "  la  voluptt  is  the 
art  of  using  pleasures  with  delicacy  and  to  taste 


PLEASURE  89 

them  with  sentiment",?  What  is  the  difference 
between  this  attitude  and  that  of  the  patriot  who 
dies  for  his  country,  of  the  martyr  who  endures 
the  scorching  flame  as  a  witness  for  his  faith  ?  Is 
there  any  ascertainable  link  between  the  attitude 
of  the  Chesterfields  and  those  others  we  have 
quoted,  and  that,  to  take  one  instance  out  of  many, 
of  a  Pionius,  one  of  the  Decian  martyrs,  who,  when 
told  by  the  people  of  Smyrna  that  "  it  was  good 
to  live  and  to  see  the  light,"  replied  :  "  Yes,  life  is 
good,  but  there  is  a  better  life.  Light  is  good  if 
it  be  the  true  light.  All  around  us  is  good  and 
fair  ;  we  do  not  wish  for  death  or  hate  the  works 
of  God.  But  there  is  a  better  world  in  comparison 
with  which  we  despise  this." 

We  are  here  at  the  root  of  the  whole  matter. 
These  utterances,  so  widely  contrasted,  are  never- 
theless all  human  and  all  natural.  But  they  are 
on  varying  scales.  They  are  a  kind  of  psychological 
strata,  exhibiting  different  stages  in  the  evolution 
of  the  soul.  Throughout  them  all  there  is,  be  it 
observed,  one  ground-note.  Nature  is  in  all  of 
them  true  to  her  assertion  of  pleasure  being  essen- 
tially a  good.  The  difference  is  in  the  kind  of 
pleasure  and  the  kind  of  good.  The  renunciator, 
the  patriot,  the  martyr,  in  a  word,  the  spiritual 
man,  has  no  disagreement  with  the  rest  on  our 
first  question.  They  do  not  belittle  God's  world. 
They  are  not  so  foolish  as  to  decry  that  marvellous 
system — evidence  in  its  every  detail  of  the  Eternal 
beneficence — by  which  the  sum  of  things  yields  un- 
ceasingly to  us  its  usufruct  of  enjoyment.  But  the 
music  for  them  has  become  scientific.  It  has 


90          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

advanced  beyond  the  first  simple  air.  It  contains 
that,  losing  none  of  its  melody,  but  into  the  com- 
position some  other  elements,  from  a  higher  source, 
have  come.  Knowing  the  animal  pleasures,  they 
find  they  are  more  than  animals  ;  that  they  are 
spirits,  in  a  spiritual  universe,  which  in  its  turn 
yields  its  delights.  Their  endurance  of  bodily  pains, 
of  material  losses  at  the  call  of  principle,  was  never 
regarded  by  them  as  a  contradiction  of  that  law 
of  Nature  which  fixes  enjoyment  as  the  outcome 
and  goal  of  all  healthy  effort.  If  the  delight  was 
not  there  at  the  moment  their  faith  saw  it  waiting. 
Their  endurance  was  a  price  paid  for  the  truer 
well-being  and  enjoyment  of  their  fellows.  "  Oh, 
my  beloved  and  dearest,"  writes  Athanasius  from 
his  exile  to  his  friends,  "if  it  is  from  tribulations 
we  must  pass  to  comfort,  we  ought  not  to  be  grieved 
or  frightened  .  .  .  but  to  treat  such  things 
as  a  probation."  There  is  here,  we  say,  always 
the  ground  tone  of  a  happiness  present  or  to  come. 
More  than  that.  We  have  spoken  of  that  mar- 
vellous range  of  the  law  of  pleasure  by  which  the 
most  unlikely  objects  are  made  to  yield  it.  A 
modern  school  of  philosophy  has  sneered  im- 
measurably at  the  Christian  theory  of  self-denial. 
And  undoubtedly  the  principle  in  earlier  times  was 
carried  to  unreasonable  lengths — beyond  all  that 
the  New  Testament  enjoins.  Yet  in  what  seem  to  us 
their  wildest  excesses  the  ascetics  exhibit  to  us 
no  breach  of  continuity  in  the  law  of  enjoyment ; 
what  they  instead  reveal  are  the  immense  joy- 
reserves  of  the  soul.  We  see  here  men  stripping 
themselves  of  every  outer  good,  of  every  comfort 


PLEASURE  91 

of  the  senses,  because  they  had  discovered  inner 
resources  so  full  and  so  intense  as  made  these  other 
pleasures  infantile  in  comparison.  Does  anyone 
doubt  that  Jesus  on  the  Cross  had  a  deeper  joy  than 
Caesar  on  his  throne  ;  that  Francis  of  Assisi  pos- 
sessed the  world  more  truly  than  the  reigning 
pope  and  emperor  ? 

The  truths  which  emerge  from  a  study  of  this 
kind  seem  now  fairly  obvious.  The  system  of 
things  has  been  constructed  with  a  view  to  uni- 
versal enjoyment.  Man  at  the  height  he  has  now 
reached  has  a  vast  scale  from  which  he  may  choose. 
To  live  amongst  the  lower  animal  pleasures  is  to 
desert  his  rank,  to  deny  the  spiritual  order  to  which 
he  belongs.  The  martyrs,  the  renunciators,  believe 
in  pleasure  ;  they  have  it  in  their  sacrifice  ;  they 
know  they  are  by  their  sacrifice  procuring  it  for 
others.  No  present  circumstances  can  hinder  the 
ultimate  reign  of  the  nobler  joy.  Out  of  the  present 
tribulation  will  come  the  far  more  exceeding  and 
eternal  weight  of  glory. 


VIII 
Religion  and  Ghosts 

EVERYBODY  to-day  talks  of  psychic  phenomena. 
The  theme  has  become  almost  the  next  after  the 
weather.  The  subject  is  not  as  yet  an  entirely 
serious  one  with  the  public.  It  is,  like  mothers-in-law 
or  marriage  with  a  deceased  wife's  sister,  a  topic 
for  badinage.  There  is,  nevertheless,  far  more  in 
it  than  has  been  discovered  by  the  jesters.  The 
facts,  so  far  as  we  know  them,  are  indeed  not  at  all 
a  laughing  matter.  They  come  and  go,  leaving 
scant  opportunity  for  accurate  observation ;  yet 
even  in  passing  they  flash  a  gleam  which,  like 
sudden  lightning  on  the  waters,  opens  the  vision 
of  unfathomed  depths  beneath. 

. /;  We  propose  here  to  discuss  the  relation  of  this 
question  to  religion.  We  are,  of  course,  not  the 
first  to  follow  that  track.  A  modern  philosophy 
greatly  in  vogue  goes  back  to  ghosts  for  its  theory 
of  religious  origins.  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  finds 
here  the  starting  point  of  the  belief  in  a  future 
state,  and  of  the  systems  of  religion  that  are  built 
upon  it.  In  his  dreams  the  savage,  while  his 
body  lay  inert  on  the  ground,  found  himself  moving 
freely,  conversing,  recognising  as  close  to  him 

92 


RELIGION  AND  GHOSTS  93 

people  who  he  knew  were  far  distant,  or  long  since 
passed  away.  These  apparitions,  in  sleep  or  trance, 
were  to  him  as  real  as  the  actual  world.  From 
them  he  conceived «  a  spiritual  world,  where  the 
soul  moved  when  the  body  was  inert  or  dead.  His 
waking  imagination  easily  confirmed  the  dreams 
of  the  night.  The  vision,  the  ghostly  appearance, 
became  actualities  in  his  scheme  of  life.  The 
ancestor  he  had  seen  hi  his  dream  was  existent  in 
the  unseen.  He  must  open  communication  with 
him  ;  he  must  pay  homage  to  his  chiefs  yonder, 
and  to  whatsoever  powers  ruled  there  beside. 

On  this,  it  may  be  said,  to  begin  with,  that  if  it 
were  admitted  as  in  itself  an  accurate  account  of 
religious  beginnings,  there  would  lie  here  no  argu- 
ment whatever  against  the  authority  and  the 
sanctions  of  religion  as  we  know  it.  To  say  that 
religion  came  to  us  through  a  lowly  gateway  is 
simply  to  offer  us  one  more  instance  of  the  uni- 
versal order.  Everything  has  come  to  us  that  way. 
Nothing  would  be  more  absurd  than  to  judge  of 
the  proportions  and  significance  of  a  life-fact 
by  its  first  appearances.  Nature,  in  planning  her 
great  achievements,  always  begins  low.  She  makes 
no  show  at  the  start ;  gives  no  hint,  in  the  first  rude 
sketch,  of  the  wealth  of  genius  that  is  yet  to  appear. 
With  a  millionaire's  resources,  she  starts  on  thirty 
shillings  a  week.  In  her  magnificent  evolution,  what 
appears  at  first  is  nothing.  The  question  always  to 
be  asked  is,  "  What  lies  behind  ?  "  And  nowhere 
do  we  so  need  to  ask  it  as  in  discussing  religion. 

But  a  defence  of  this  kind  is  now  almost  un- 
necessary. A  curious  change  is  coming  over  opinion. 


94          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Thirty  years  ago  the  dream  and  ghost  theory  was 
being  urged  as  a  disparagement  of  the  religious 
position.  The  spiritual  concept  was  shown  as  a 
product  of  savagery,  and  that  seemed  enough  to 
dispose  of  its  claims.  But  to-day  we  approach  the 
subject  from  another  starting-point.  A  different 
question  is  being  asked.  "  Why  is  it,"  the  modern 
thinker  demands,  "  that  among  all  the  races  of 
mankind,  civilised  and  uncivilised,  there  has  appeared 
and  has  survived,  the  belief  in  a  life  after  death  ?  " 
For  nothing  apparently  is  more  contrary  to  the 
evidence.  The  vote  of  the  senses  is  dead  against  it. 
The  mind,  as  Lucretius  long  ago  pointed  out, 
appears  to  follow  exactly  the  fortunes  of  the  body. 
His 

Prseterea  gigni  pariter  cum  corpore  et  una 
Crescere  sentimus  pariterque  senescere  mentem. 

(Besides,  we  see  the  mind  to  be  born  with  the  body, 
and  grow  with  the  body,  and  to  decay  with  it) 
seems  to  settle  the  whole  matter.  When  death 
comes  the  entire  system  breaks  up.  The  separate 
particles,  held  together  no  longer  by  the  vital  bond, 
form  new  combinations.  The  elements  are  here, 
for  they  are  eternal,  but  the  form  we  knew  is  gone 
and  will  return  no  more. 

With  all  this  for  man  to  think  about,  why  his 
permanent  belief  in  survival  ?  We  say  nothing  here 
of  those  new  aspects  of  matter  and  its  mysterious 
potencies  which  the  latest  science  is  revealing. 
Radium,  the  properties  of  radiant  matter,  the 
energy  of  electrons,  the  composition  of  the  molecule, 
the  entire  range  of  supersensual  physics,  open  to 
us  vistas  of  thought  of  which  our  fathers  knew 


RELIGION  AND  GHOSTS  95 

nothing.  But  what  they  count  for  in  the  argu- 
ment is  aside  from  our  immediate  question,  which 
is,  "  Why  have  men  in  all  the  past  ages,  with  the 
evidence  of  the  senses  so  powerfully  against  them, 
believed  that  the  soul  survived  death's  catastrophe  ?  " 
That  they  did  so  is  seen  in  all  literature.  Vedic 
hymns,  3,500  years  old,  sing  of  a  spiritual  body  inside 
the  fleshly  one,  by  which  the  dead  rise  to  heaven. 
And  that  note  is  everywhere.  The  answer  which 
is  being  given  to-day,  and  by  men  who  have  every 
claim  to  be  heard,  is  largely  in  the  Spencerian  direc- 
tion, but  with  a  new  point  and  a  new  emphasis. 
They  hold  that  the  belief  did  come  from  the  dream 
and  the  apparition,  but  with  the  addition  that 
some  at  least  of  the  dreams  and  some  of  the  appari- 
tions were  really  valid  as  evidence,  and  have  to-day 
to  be  accepted  as  such. 

We  have  in  fact  on  this  subject  reached  a  new 
position.  For  the  first  time  in  history  the  question 
of  apparitions,  of  psychic  phenomena  in  general, 
has  been  taken  up  as  a  branch  of  science.  We  are 
far  from  the  attitude  so  humorously  expressed  by 
Fontenelle,  who  "  didn't  believe  in  ghosts,  but  ^ 
was  afraid  of  them."  Our  age  wants  to  know,  and 
is  on  the  track  of  knowing.  It  is  collecting  the 
evidence  that  has  floated  down  the  ages,  and  is 
examining  it  with  a  new  eye.  It  is  boldly  entering 
this  dim  region  in  search  of  its  laws.  The  frame  of 
mind  which  dismissed  the  ancient  stories  with  a 
shrug,  is  recognised  not  as  science  but  as  ignorance. 
A  record  such,  for  instance,  as  that  of  Apollonius 
of  Tyana,  that  when  at  Ephesus  he  saw  in  spirit  the 
assassination  of  Domitian  at  Rome  ;  crying  out 


96          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

suddenly  in  the  midst  of  his  friends,  "  Strike  him 
down,  the  tyrant !  "  and  declaring  immediately, 
"  Domitian  has  just  been  slain,"  is  accepted  to-day  as 
falling  entirely  within  the  category  of  the  possible^ 
The  researches  of  a  Oookes,  of  a  Myers,  of  a  Gurney, 
of  a  Rochas,  of  a  Gabriel  Delanne,  have  brought 
within  our  view  a  mass  of  facts  which  are  as  solidly 
based  as  they  are  wonderful.  With  many  of  these 
explorers  the  existence  of  an  ethereal  body  within 
the  material,  which  can  be  exteriorised  under 
certain  conditions,  is  held  as  proved.  Sir  William 
Crookes  has  taken  photographs  of  these  materiali- 
sations. M.  Rochas  speaks  of  an  externalised 
consciousness  which  feels  a  touch  or  a  pin  prick. 
Swedenborg  communicated  messages  from  deceased 
persons  to  relatives  on  matters  of  fact  which  were 
found  to  be  accurate  in  every  detail.  Had  Kant 
lived  in  our  day  he  would  probably  have  gone  further 
than  his  recorded  admission  on  this  subject,  striking 
as  it  is  from  one  of  his  quality  :  "  For  my  part, 
ignorant  as  I  am  of  the  way  in  which  the  human 
spirit  enters  the  world,  and  the  ways  in  which 
it  goes  out  of  it,  I  dare  not  deny  the  truth  of  many 
of  the  narratives  that  are  in  circulation." 

But  if  this  body  of  evidence  is  to  be  accepted 
as  containing  at  least  a  nucleus  of  fact,  what  is 
the  relation  of  it  to  religion  as  we  know  it  ?  The 
relation  is  very  evident  and  very  immediate. 
The  sphere  we  are  investigating,  let  us  admit,  is 
one  that  lends  itself  readily  to  imposture,  and  it 
is  one  where  the  impostor  has  revelled.  "  Sludge, 
the  Medium,"  has  displayed  himself  here  in  all 
his  cunning,  in  all  his  vulgarity.  Yet  a  Brown- 


RELIGION  AND  GHOSTS  97 

ing,  in  the  midst  of  his  merciless  exposure,  finds 
at  the  bottom  of  the  business  a  residuum  which 
his  scepticism  cannot  get  over.  His  own  belief 
one  sees  is  in  that  final  question, 

Which  of  those  who  say  they  disbelieve, 
Your  clever  people,  but  has  dreamed  his  dream, 
Caught  his  coincidence,  stumbled  on  his  fact, 
He  can't  explain  ? 

And  amid  the  thousand  impostures  it  is  the  one 
fact  that  counts.  As  Hegel  has  it :  "  Dem  Begriffe 
nach  einmal  ist  allemal."  ("In  the  region  of 
ideas  '  once '  is  equal  to  '  always.'  ")  The  one 
fact  clears  away  all  a  priori  impossibilities,  for,  as 
Aristotle  says  :  "  Things  which  have  happened 
are  manifestly  possible,  for  if  they  had  been  im- 
possible they  would  not  have  happened."  One 
single  message  from  the  unseen  world  and  that 
unseen  is  proved  as  actual.  One  demonstration 
that  the  soul  can  act  outside  the  body,  and  the 
question  of  its~survival  of  death  has  entered  on  a 
new  phase. 

And  this  question  becomes,  we  say,  immediately 
religious.  It  gives  the  death-blow  to  that  material- 
ism of  which  Goethe  once  said  "  the  theory  which 
reduces  all  things  to  matter  and  motion  appeared 
to  me  so  grey,  so  Cimmerian,  and  so  dead,  that  we 
shuddered  at  it  as  at  a  ghost."  On  the  contrary, 
man  is  here  shown  to  be  a  spiritual  being,  in  a 
spiritual  universe,  and  the  difference  is  immense.  The 
thought  of  a  continuance  of  being  is,  and  by  the 
constitution  of  human  nature  must  necessarily  be, 
one  of  the  great  religious  motives.  We  may  talk 

7 


98          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

of  "  virtue  being  its  own  reward,"  and  of  "  doing 
right  because  it  is  right,"  but  it  remains  that  the 
thought  of  sheer  extinction ;  of  our  endeavour 
ending,  so  far  as  we  are  concerned,  in  utter  nothing- 
ness ;  of  OUT  virtue  or  our  vice  debouching,  after 
a  few  brief  years,  into  the  same  all-swallowing 
n/ant — must  make  all  the  difference  to  the  struggle. 

Moreover,  the  facts  won  in  this  research  carry 
so  much  that  is  intimately  religious  with  them. 
They  are  in  accord  with  all  the  soul's  aspirations, 
when  it  is  at  its  highest.  Are  we  not  continually 
saying  to  ourselves  : 

And  thus  I  know  this  earth  is  not  my  sphere, 
For  I  cannot  so  narrow  me  but  that 
I  still  exceed  it  ? 

And  this  other  feature  of  the  situation,  that  into 
the  unseen  state  we  carry  no  smallest  item  of  our 
outward  possessions  ;  that  houses,  lands,  shares, 
our  ornaments  and  jewels  of  price,  our  luxury  and 
splendour  of  living,  fall  absolutely  away,  leaving 
as  sole  residuum  the  accumulations  of  our  inner 
consciousness,  what  make  we  of  that  ?  Once 
scientifically  apprehended  and  solidly  fixed  in 
the  mind,  it  should  be  the  death,  surely,  of  that 
insane  coveting,  of  the  mad  lust  for  wealth  which 
rages  to-day  ?  Filled  with  these  truths,  a  man 
ceases  to  be  in  a  hurry.  His  outlook  takes  in 
eternity.  As  the  years  pass  his  interest  in  life 
does  not  diminish,  but  rather  increases.  Herhas 
a  stake  in  it  beyond  what  is  seen. 

But  the  soul 

Whence  the  love  comes  ; — all  ravage  leaves  that  whole. 
Vainly  the  flesh  fades  ;  soul  makes  all  things  new. 

4M 


RELIGION  AND  GHOSTS  99 

Finally,  it  is  on  the  great  fact  of  the  spiritual 
world  that  the  New  Testament  rests.  Its  whole 
implication  is  there.  That  the  visible  is  the  vesti- 
bule of  a  greater  invisible  ;  that  the  material  is 
symbol  of  the  immaterial ;  that  body  is  for  the 
sake  of  soul ;  that  earthly  conditions  are  for  the 
working  out  of  Divine  conclusions  ;  that  death  is 
but  transition  ;  that  the  spirit  in  which  we  are 
now  doing  our  work  will  show  itself  in  consciousness 
a  thousand  ages  hence  ;  these  are  parts  of  Christ's 
Gospel ;  and  these  are  carried  also  in  the  facts 
offered  us  to-day.  Truly  they  are  facts  to  ponder. 
And  in  pondering  them  we  may  ask  our  poet's 
question  : 

When  earth  breaks  up  and  heaven  expands, 
How  will  the  change  strike  me  and  you, 
In  the  house  not  made  with  hands  ? 


IX 
Religion    and    the    Concrete 

PHILOSOPHY,  since  Locke's  day,  has  made  a  pro- 
digious pother  over  the  aphorism  of  which  he, 
having  first  borrowed  it  from  the  schoolmen,  made 
such  use  :  "  Nihil  in  intellectu  quod  non  'prius  in 
sensu "  (the  intellect  holds  nothing  which  did 
not  come  first  as  an  appeal  to  the  senses).  Kant, 
starting  where  Locke  left  off,  and  taking  his  thesis 
as  a  challenge,  showed  how  much  there  was  in 
the  intellect  beyond  the  sensuous  impression ; 
how  the  external  fact,  on  its  way  to  us,  took  its 
entire  shape  and  colour  from  the  mental  machinery 
that  received  it.  But  the  Locke  dictum,  though, 
as  we  now  see,  it  has  to  be  taken  under  conditions 
and  limitations,  is  one  we  all  need  to  study,  and 
especially  those  whose  business  is  with  the  problems 
of  religion.  Religion  is,  first  of  all,  a  psychology  ; 
to  deal  with  it  properly,  either  in  thought  or  action, 
we  need  to  know  the  laws  of  the  realm  in  which  it 
operates.  And  one  of  the  chief  things  to  be  noted 
in  this  region  is  the  relation  of  the  senses  to  the  soul 
behind.  It  is  to  the  way  in  which  the  different 
churches  have  understood  this  relation,  a  good  deal 
more  than  from  this  or  that  dogma  they  have 
handled,  that  they  owe  their  success  or  their  failure. 


100 


RELIGION  AND  THE  CONCRETE       101 

The  point  is  this — that  before  we  can  get  effec- 
tively at  a  man's  reason  or  his  conscience,  we  have 
to  touch  his  senses.  Our  neighbour  is  a  being  who 
first  of  all  sees,  hears,  tastes  and  feels.  And  his 
inner  life  consists  in  largest  degree  of  memories, 
mental  pictures,  of  things  he  has  seen,  heard,  tasted 
and  felt.  The  abstractions  of  the  philosopher  are 
a  later  development,  quite  out  of  range  of  masses 
of  men,  and  even  to  the  most  cultured — as  personal 
experiment  will  easily  show — far  less  operative 
and  powerful  than  the  fact  that  impinges  on  the 
senses.  Compare  the  impression  on  a  man  of  any 
general  proposition  you  can  frame  with  the  announce- 
ment to  him  that  he  is  to  be  hanged  to-morrow, 
or  that  some  one  has  left  him  a  fortune,  and  you 
will  have  the  measure  of  the  difference  in  psychical 
effect  between  the  abstract  and  the  concrete. 

It  is  this  simple  truth,  so  obvious  when  we  come 
to  look  at  it,  that  opens  to  us,  as  by  a  magic 
"  sesame,"  the  secret  of  the  world's  religions. 
Man,  to  be  impressed,  must  have  first  and  foremost 
the  concrete.  The  abstract  is  the  latest  term— 
at  the  other  end  of  the  string.  The  invisible  must, 
ere  we  can  do  anything  with  it,  be  embodied  in  a 
visible.  It  is  because  of  this  that  philosophy  as 
such  can  never  become  a  religion.  Aristotle  himself 
recognises  this  when,  speaking  of  treatises  on  morals, 
he  says  :  "  The  truth  is  they  seem  to  have  power  to 
urge  on  and  to  excite  young  men  of  liberal  minds 
.  .  .  but  that  they  have  no  power  to  persuade 
the  multitude  to  what  is  virtuous  and  honourable." 
Your  truth  must  become  a  life,  be  seen  visiblyt 
walking  about,  before  it  can  move  men.  The) 


102        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE. 

Baptist  theology  of  the  seventeenth  century  is  at 
present  read  by  no  mortal ;  or,  at  least,  by  very  few. 
But  that  theology,  incarnated  in  a  Greatheart,  a 
Mr.  Honest,  and  the  other  characters  of  Bunyan's 
immortal  dream,  has  been  and  is  the  delight  of 
millions.  "  For  truth  embodied  in  a  tale,  may  enter 
in  by  lowly  doors."  But  it  must  be  embodied. 
That  is  why  abstract  theisms  and  other  intangible 
systems  have  never  had,  and  never  will  have,  any 
position  amongst  the  religions  of  the  world. 

And  this  brings  us  to  the  centre  of  our  theme. 
Religion,  which  has  to  deal  with  the  highest  reality, 
can  only  in  this  matter  follow  the  universal  law. 
Its  truth  must  be  embodied.  But  that  statement 
spells  Incarnation.  It  is  wonderful  to  see  how, 
in  the  twentieth  century,  the  roads  of  the  new 
science,  of  the  new  culture,  are  found  to  be  leading 
— all  of  them — in  one  and  the  same  direction. 
The  central  truth  of  the  New  Testament  shows, 
in  the  new  light  of  this  culture,  as  a  truth  embedded 
in  the  nature  of  things,  as  inevitable  to  the  human 
evolution.  God  could  never  be  known  to  man 
except  by  a  self-manifestation.  What  He  is  and 
means  could  only,  human  nature  being  what  it  is, 
be  exhibited  by  a  Life.  It  is  curious  here  to  note 
how,  in  the  view  of  human  spiritual  development 
which  modern  research  is  offering  us,  the  old 
controversies  concerning  the  Divinity  of  Christ 
have  lost  their  starting-point.  The  rival  camps  are 
deserted,  for  the  world  has  moved  on.  The  new 
conception  derived  from  history  and  psychology  of 
the  whole  human  movement,  gives  us  at  once 
Christ's  Divinity  and  Humanity  as  the  natural 


RELIGION  AND  THE  CONCRETE       103 

expression  of  a  cosmic  process.  We  are  here  to 
know  God  and  to  be  united  with  Him.  And  we 
could  not  have  reached  up  to  Him  unless  He  had 
first  reached  down  to  us.  We  could  not  see  Him 
unless  He  made  Himself  visible.  God  must  come 
into  the  sphere  of  the  concrete  ere  he  can  be  appre- 
hended of  the  human  heart.  As  Ritschl  puts  it : 
"  The  essence  of  God,  as  it  is  Spirit,  and^Will,  and 
especially  Love,  can  become  operative  in  a  human 
Life,  as  man  in  fact  is  constituted  for  spirit,  will, 
love."  To  quote  Jacobi's  profound  word  :  "  Nature 
conceals  God  ;  man  reveals  Him."  He  is  in  all  of 
us,  for  there  could  be  no  outside  revelatior  unless 
it  appealed  to  one  within.  In  Christ  we  see  this 
eternal  idea  reaching  its  culmination.  As  the 
great  Greek  Father  Theodore  of  Mopsuestia  puts 
it:  "Jesus  so  perfectly  appropriated  the^ Divine 
as  to  become  one  with  it."  In  Him,  our  'Aca£ 
ivSpw,  our  "  Divinest  Symbol,"  as  Carlyle  has 
it,  we  have  the  Divine  concreted,  as  much  of  God 
as  humanity  could  contain. 

But  the  concrete  in  religion  is  far  more  than  a 
doctrinal  question.  It  enters  in  the  most  intimate 
way  into  the  Church's  whole  method  of  presenting 
religion  to  the  world.  As  we  study  the  history  of 
this  matter  and  observe  the  different  methods 
of  appeal  to  the  various  religious  bodies,  we  wonder 
continually  whether  it  ever  occurred  to  their  leaders 
that  there  was  such  a  thing  as  a  psychological  law 
in  this  region,  whose  observance  or  non-observance 
spelt  success  or  failure  ?  Where  they  have  hit  on 
the  law  seems  so  often  to  have  been  by  sheer  chance 
rather  than  by  insight.  It  is  clear,  for  instance, 


104        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE, 

that  the  enormous^and  continued  power  ot  Rome, 
notwithstanding  the  immense  and  ever-growing 
forces  against  her,  has  been  owing  more  than 
anything  else  to  an  apparently  unconscious  follow- 
ing of  our  law.  She  has  held  men  by  giving  them, 
in  every  direction,  the  concrete.  It  was  she  who 
introduced  the  picture  into  the  churches.  Her 
creed,  however  faulty  we  may  consider  it,  was  at  all 
events  a  concrete  creed,  full  of  clear-cut  statement. 
What  has  been  the  fascination  of  her  Mass  ?  Has  it 
not  been  in  the  belief  she  created  that  here,  in  view 
of  the  humblest  soul,  was  the  God  so  thirsted  after, 
made  present  and  visible  ?  The  problem  she  sets 
before  all  competing  religious  bodies — a  tough  one, 
it  must  be  confessed — is  to  follow  her  method  while 
avoiding  her  impossibles  ;  to  offer  a  religious  appeal 
as  vivid  as  her  own,  but  whose  basis  shall  be  fact 
and  not  fiction. 

The  Reformation  Churches  have  been  Churches 
of  speech  rather  than  of  sign  ;  they  have  sought  the 
soul  through  the  ear  rather  than  the  eye.  But  here 
again  we  have  to  notice  that  this  appeal  has  been 
effective  or  otherwise  just  in  proportion  as  the 
principle  of  the  concrete  has  been  observed  or 
neglected.  Any  one  who  takes  the  trouble  to 
study  Church  eloquence — the  utterances  of  the 
religious  orators  of  all  ages  and  their  effects  upon 
men — will  always  find  that  their  power  has  rested 
largely  on  obedience  to  our  law.  The  addresses 
that  tell  are  stuffed  with  the  concrete  ;  they  are  not 
abstract  discussions,  but  live  facts,  live  experiences, 
live  pictures.  The  truth  they  wanted  to  enforce 
had  always  hands  and  feet ;  it  lived  and  breathed 


RELIGION  AND  THE  CONCRETE       105 

before  men.  The  early  Fathers  had  abstractions 
enough,  but  always  at  one  end  of  them  there  was 
some  homely,  earth-born  fact.  Take,  for  example, 
as  one  out  of  a  thousand,  this  extract  from  Alexander 
of  Alexandria  :  "  They  suspended  Him  on  the  tree"! 
who  stretches  out  the  earth  ;  they  transfixed  Him 
with  nails  who  laid  firm  the  foundations  of  the  world  ; 
they  circumscribed  Him  who  circumscribed  the 
heavens  ;  they  bound  Him  who  absolves  sinners  ; 
they  gave  Him  over  to  the  tomb  who  raised  the 
dead  to  life."  The  words  remind  us  of  Hooker, 
who  more  than  a  millennium  later  speaks  thus  of 
the  sacrament :  "  These  mysteries  do  as  nails 
fasten  us  to  His  very  cross  ;  that  by  them  we  draw 
out  astonishing  efficacy,  force  and  virtue,  even  the 
blood  of  His  gored  side ;  in  the  wounds  of  our 
Redeemer  we  there  dip  our  tongues,  we  are  dyed 
red  both  within  and  without ;  our  hunger  is  satisfied, 
and  our  thirst  for  ever  quenched."  We  are  dis- 
cussing here,  be  it  remembered,  not  the  doctrine 
but  the  method.  The  words  quoted  may  easily 
offend  our  taste  or  our  philosophy,  or  both.  The 
point  is  that  they  offer  in  religious  speech  the 
example,  followed  by  all  the  great  pleaders  from 
Chrysostom  to  Spurgeon,  of  discourse  in  which  , 
spiritual  truth  is  clothed  in  concrete  forms  that' 
appeal  to  every  man's  senses  and  imagination.  J 
The  lessons  from  all  this  are  tolerably  obvious. 
The  religion  of  to-day  must  in  all  its  departments 
fill  itself  with  the  concrete.  The  preacher  must  have 
his  grasp  upon  facts,  upon  experiences,  upon  life. 
His  business  is  with  the  invisible,  but  unless  he  can 
turn  his  invisibles  into  visibles— condense  his  cloud 


106        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

into  rain — he  is  of  no  use  in  the  pulpit.  In  like 
manner  the  Church,  in  its  collective  operations, 
has  to  master  the  same  art.  It  must  learn  to 
embody  its  aspirations,  its  enthusiasms,  its  faith, 
into  institutions  and  organisms  which  catch  the 
world's  eye  and  compel  its  attention.  The  engineer 
builds  his  creed  into  his  bridge.  The  Church  must 
build  hers  into  something  as  evident  and  as  useful. 
But  the  greatest  of  all  concretes  is  man  himself. 
He  is  full  of  mysteries,  of  invisibles,  the  secret  of 
which  he  cannot  fathom.  The  end  of  all  the  ages 
is  there  hidden  within  him.  Could  he  but  under- 
stand himself  he  would  understand  God  and  the 
Universe.  He  is  a  vast  embodied  idea.  But  the 
idea  needs  clarifying,  unifying.  The  supreme 
effort  of  religion  is  to  accomplish  this  for  him.  It 
seeks  to  incarnate  its  own  spirit  in  him.  Chris- 
tianity in  the  creed,  Christianity  in  the  institution, 
are  nothing  in  effective  force  compared  with  Chris- 
tianity alive  in  the  man.  Darwin  found  in  the  South 
Sea  Islanders,  transformed  by  missionary  effort, 
an  argument  for  Christianity  such  as  he  had  met 
nowhere  in  books.  The  Church,  whatever  its  name 
be  called,  which  succeeds  best  in  making  the  New 
Testament  faith  and  love  concrete  in  human  lives, 
will  be  the  Church  of  the  future. 


X 
Doctrine  and  Life 

HAS  modern  society  a  genuine  and  definable  doctrine 
of  life  ?  Has  it,  that  is  to  say,  a  practical  creed, 
which  it  entirely  believes,  and  by  which  it  seeks  to 
shape  its  conduct  ?  The  question,  it  will  be  remem- 
bered, was  directly  raised  in  the  famous  "  Do  we 
Believe  ?  "  controversy,  which  occupied  the  columns 
of  a  leading  London  daily  some  time  ago.  In  the 
letter  which  started  the  discussion,  the  writer 
placed  the  formulated  doctrines  of  orthodox  Chris- 
tianity in  direct  and  vivid  contrast  with  the  maxims 
by  which,  as  he  asserted,  modern  society  regulates 
its  practice.  The  inference  was  that  a  gulf  separated 
the  two  ;  that  society's  orthodoxy  was  a  pose,  if 
not  an  hypocrisy  ;  that  the  creed  which  it  repeated 
in  church  was  quite  other  than  the  one  by  which 
it  worked  and  lived.  The  public  answer  to  this 
challenge  was  of  a  very  varied  character,  but  one 
thing  clearly  revealed  in  it  was  the  confusion  on  the 
subject  which  prevails  in  the  general  mind.  The 
same  condition  is  shown  in  the  attitude  to  religious 
education.  The  Englishman  met  by  the  question, 
"  What  is  the  religious  teaching  you  wish  for  your 
children  ?  "  is  puzzled  for  a  reply.  He  is  not  quite 

107 


108        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

sure  what,  on  these  matters,  he  believes  himself.  We 
do  not  propose  here — that  would  be  too  presump- 
tuous— to  supply  him  with  his  answer.  But,  as  a 
help  in  that  direction,  it  may  be  worth  while  to 
study  an  anterior  and  closely  allied  theme.  Before 
we  talk  of  this  or  that  doctrine  we  need  to  know 
something  about  the  nature  of  doctrine  hi  itself, 
and  its  actual  relation  to  life. 

The  subject,  when  looked  into,  divides,  we  find, 
into  two  separate  departments.  There  is,  for  one 
thing,  the  relation  of  the  doctrinal  system  we 
profess  to  our  individual  life  and  conduct,  and  for 
another  the  relation  of  our  system,  or  any  system, 
to  life  itself  as  a  cosmic  process.  The  two  depart- 
ments, as  we  shall  see,  are  intimately  allied,  but  the 
results  they  offer  are  entirely  distinct. 

The  doctrinal  systems  with  which  we  are  most 
familiar  are,of  course,those  of  the  Christian  Churches. 
As  we  contemplate  these  structures — the  massive 
thought-monuments  of  Christendom,  standing  up 
so  clear  and  so  majestic  out  of  the  mists  and 
the  wrecks  of  the  past — we  receive  an  impression 
of  passive  and  immobile  strength.  "  Semper  Eadem" 
is  the  motto  engraven  on  their  front.  Enduring 
without  change,  amid  the  passing  of  dynasties  and 
kingdoms,  they  remind  us  of  some  Alp  or  Apennine, 
lifting  its  eternal  summit  in  sublime  contrast  with 
the  hurry  and  swift  wasting  of  the  human  crowds 
below. 

The  illustration  might  indeed  be  used,  but  its 
lesson  is  different  from  the  one  we  have  suggested. 
The  great  creed-systems  are  like  the  mountains  ; 
but  it  is  not  immobility,  rather  the  opposite  of  it, 


DOCTRINE  AND  LIFE  109 

in  which  their  likeness  consists.  It  is  precisely  because 
"  the  everlasting  hills "  are  everlasting  only  in 
appearance  that  they  resemble  so  closely  the 
theologic  ranges  which  dominate  from  their  heights 
the  thoughts  of  men.  Nowhere  than  in  the  moun- 
tains, though  we  call  them  our  monuments  of 
eternity,  can  we  study  better  the  constant  flux 
of  all  visible  things.  Your  Alp  changes  from 
year  to  year.  There  is  no  moment  when  the  winds, 
the  frosts,  the  rains,  the  summer  heats  are  not 
leaving  their  mark  upon  it.  The  Matterhorn, 
most  impregnable  apparently  of  rock  fortresses, 
is  really,  as  Tyndall  called  it,  a  huge  ruin.  Geo- 
logists say  that  our  Snowdon  is  only  a  remnant 
of  itself.  Its  original  mass,  which  lifted  it  once 
to  twenty  thousand  feet  of  height,  is  now  strewn 
over  Wales  and  Western  England. 

This  beat  of  the  elements  upon  the  mountains 
represents,  we  say,  hi  some  degree,  though  not 
entirely,  the  process  which  our  doctrinal  systems 
are  undergoing.  These  also,  while  meant  by  their 
builders  to  be  final,  belong  to  a  sphere  where  there 
is  no  finality.  Indeed,  the  law  of  change  here  is 
more  rapid,  and  more  certain  in  its  operations, 
than  upon  a  Helvellyn  or  a  Mont  Blanc.  The 
attack  upon  the  hills  is  mainly  an  external  one. 
The  thought-hills,  on  the  other  hand,  while  subject 
to  impacts  of  that  kind,  are  exposed  to  a  process  far 
more  rapidly  and  inevitably  disintegrating.  They 
are  exposed  to  a  constant  movement  from  within. 

To  explain  that  we  need  now  to  ask  ourselves 
the  question,  "  What  is  doctrine  ?  "  It  is  some- 
what odd  that  in  the  multitude  of  controversies 


110        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

which  rage  round  this  theme,  so  few  seem  to  have 
made  for  themselves  that  preliminary  but  all- 
important  inquiry.  If  we  examine  the  matter 
scientifically — that  is  to  say,  by  study  of  the  manner 
in  which  doctrine,  in  the  instances  known  to  us,  has 
arisen,  and  of  the  manner  in  which  it  has  assumed 
its  particular  form,  we  reach  a  formula  which 
seems  to  cover  the  entire  field.  Doctrine,  we  find, 
is  the  answer  of  the  inner  spirit  to  the  outside 
fact.  It  is  the  response  of  the  collective  conscious- 
ness of  a  given  age  to  its  experiences.  The  doctrines 
of  the  Christian  Church,  for  instance,  are  the  echo 
of  the  impressions  made  on  the  first  disciples  by 
the  historical  Christ,  and  the  circumstances  of  His 
life  and  death.  But  with  these  two  factors  before 
us,  the  outside  fact  and  the  inner  mind,  as  the 
builders  of  doctrine,  we  at  once  perceive  the  opening 
to  vast  and  inevitable  change. 

For  whatever  may  be  said  of  the  outside  fact, 
the  mind  of  man,  which  perceives  and  registers  its 
impression  of  it,  is,  we  know,  constantly  on  the 
move.  And  the  interpretation  of  the  fact  varies 
with  that  movement.  Thousands  of  years  ago 
men  looked  on  the  sun,  moon  and  stars  that  we 
know.  But  the  theory  they  formed  of  them  was 
very  different  from  ours.  And  the  facts  whose 
interpretation  constitutes  religious  belief  cannot 
be  divorced  from  this  law  of  "change.  The  witnesses 
of  nineteen  hundred  years  ago,  who  give  us  their 
impressions  of  Judsean  happenings  then,  saw  them 
in  a  light  and  through  mental  instruments  quite 
other  than  the  light  and  mind  of  to-day.  And 
the  question  which  here  thrusts  itself  on  us  is  as  to 


DOCTRINE  AND  LIFE  111 

whether,  on  the  impossible  supposition  that  our 
instructed  mentality  had  been  in  Judaea  at  that 
time  to  report,  it  would  have  rendered  any  such 
account  of  those  happenings  as  that  we  now  possess  ? 
What,  in  fact,  criticism  is  now  doing,  as  a  kind  of 
second  best  to  a  first-hand  report  of  that  kind,  is  to 
reconstruct  those  early  impressions  of  the  first 
believers  in  the  light  of  our  modern  knowledge. 

It  is  under  this  process  of  the  mind  that  the 
doctrinal  systems  of  the  past  are  wearing  down  and 
altering  their  aspect.  They  are  great  and  vener- 
able ;  but  life,  that  subtle,  all-creating  force — life, 
which  sends  perpetually  its  new  pulses  into  the 
human  soul,  is  greater  still,  and  will  have  its  way. 
What  the  Church  has  to  do  is  at  last  to  recognise 
this  simple  fact.  It  has  to  recognise  in  its  relation  to 
old-world  interpretations,  the  law  of  the  inner  spirit 
which  ever  expands  and  ever  clarifies  its  view. 
Its  failure  to  do  this  in  the  past ;  its  ignoring,  in 
this  matter,  of  one  of  the  ultimate  cosmic  laws,  is 
at  the  root  of  the  present  confusions,  and  the 
explanation  of  the  intellectual  bankruptcy  of  the 
older  Churches.  What  it  has  brought  Romanism 
to  is  pathetically  expressed  in  the  lament  of  Cardinal 
Guibert,  who,  as  far  back  as  1870,  wrote  thus  of 
his  Church  in  France  :  "  We  Christians  form  a 
society,  a  people  apart,  which,  no  longer  being 
in  communion  of  ideas  with  the  immense  society 
which  surrounds  us,  is  becoming  disintegrated, 
and  is,  in  fact,  in  full  process  of  dissolution.  It  is 
a  world  nearing  its  end."  Surely  that  world  of  the 
Romanist  ideas  is  coming  to  an  end  and  we  can 
now  see  the  entire  rationale  of  the  process  ! 


112        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

What,  then,  is  the  position  and  the  value  of 
religious  doctrine  ?  Does  this  element  of  change 
invalidate  it  ?  Is  there  no  doctrine  which  can  be 
spoken  of  as  inspired,  as  of  Divine  authority  ? 
Let  us,  in  reply,  bear  in  mind  all  the  elements  of  the 
question.  In  dealing,  as  we  have  just  done,  with 
the  action  of  the  mind,  we  touch,  let  us  remember, 
only  one  of  the  factors.  In  addition  there  remains 
that  other,  the  outside  fact  or  happening,  which 
first  set  the  mind  in  motion.  The  sun,  we  said, 
is  different  to  us  from  what  it  was  to  our  ancestors. 
But  it  is  still  the  sun,  and  a  bigger  fact  than  it 
was  to  them.  Their  view  of  it  also  had  as  much 
reality  in  it  as  was  adequate  to  their  mental  con- 
dition. It'was  such  an  approximation  to  reality  as 
was  congruous  to  their  general  growth. 

In  like  manner,  the  facts,  the  events  that  form 
the  basis  of  Christian  doctrine  are'still  there~;  and 
assuredly  not  diminished  in  their  religious  sig- 
nificance because  of  the  growth  of  the  percipient 
mind !  And  whatever  modification  may  come 
to  those  earlier  explanations,  there  will,  we  may 
confidently  assert,  be  no  change  in  the  peculiar 
appeal  which  the  facts  themselves  make  to  the  human 
spirit.  We  find  here  a  correspondence  not  lightly 
to  be  got  rid  of,  whose  importance  grows  the  more 
we  consider  it,  between  what  has  happened  in 
history  and  certain  primal  elements  of  the  soul. 
The  soul  asks  for  a  moral  explanation  of  the  uni- 
verse, and  it  is  this  which  Christianity  supplies. 
Its  spiritual  explanation  is,  we  say,  precisely  the 
thing  that  humanity  insistently  demands.  It  asks 
for  a  solution  which  science  acknowledges  its  entire 


DOCTRINE  AND  LIFE,  113 

impotence  to  give.  As  Sabatier  puts  it,  "  Science 
will  never  tell  us,  outside  an  act  of  faith,  why  life 
is  to  be  lived  well."  Herbert  Spencer  is  of  the 
same  mind.  In  one  of  his  latest  utterances  he 
recognises  that  religious  creeds  "  occupy  the^  sphere 
which  material  interpretation  seeks  to  occupy,  and 
fails  the  more  it  seeks."  The  latest  philosophy 
admits  that  the  intellect  alone  is  incapable  of  holding 
or  representing  the  entire  truth  of  life.  The  deepest 
things  in  us  are  moral  and  spiritual  impulses  which 
cannot  be  put  into  an  equation  or  a  syllogism. 

And  corresponding  with  this  attitude  and  need 
of  the  mind,  history — and  especially  the  New 
Testament  record — offers  us  personalities  and  events 
through  which  there  gleam  suggestions  and  hints  of 
a  transcendental  order,  behind  the  phenomenal 
world,  which  the  soul's  highest  aspirations  leap 
to  recognise.  The  creeds  are  the  charts  and  maps 
of  this  spiritual  realm.  The  draughtsmen  were, 
if  we  will,  clumsy  and  ill-informed,  but  the  realm 
they  sketched  was  there.  We  may  revise  their 
drawings,  but  the  reality  they  outlined  is  as  big 
and  as  rich  as  ever. 

Between  doctrine  and  life  there  will  be  ever 
that  sort  of  antagonism  which  subsists  between 
greater  and  less.  It  is  like  the  battle  of  sea  and 
shore.  We  fence  in  our  plot  of  the  idea  ;  we  wall 
it  off  from  the  outside  savage  and  untamed  material 
universe,  as  men  build  embankments  against  the 
Atlantic.  Again  and  again  man  has  awaked  to 
find  this  outer  ocean,  mute,  vast  and  terrible, 
invading  his  defences  and  sweeping  away  his 
structures  of  granite.  For  a  moment  he  despairs  ; 

8 


114        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

the  world  is  too  great,  too  subtle,  too  savage  as  it 
seems  for  his  soul.  But  the  miracle  here  is  that 
the  Power  which  deals  thus  with  him  will  not  per- 
mit his  despair.  It  tells  him  that  land  and  sea 
together  are  his.  Let  him  build  on  the  one  and 
embark  on  the  other.  Each  has  its  treasure  for 
him  f  each  shall  help  him  to  his  final  kingdom. 


DOCTRINE  AND   LITE. — II. 

With  the  topic  opened  in  this  way,  we  can  now 
proceed  to  some  of  the  other  problems  which  it 
offers  to  the  religious  thought  of  our  time.  One  of 
the  lessons  of  the  past  which  the  Church  by  this 
time  should  have  thoroughly  learned  is  the  folly 
of  claiming  for  itself  a  monopoly  of  doctrine.  In 
earlier  ages  it  aspired  to  be  the  universal  pro- 
vider. It  was  not  content  with  teaching  the  things 
it  knew.  It  taught  also  all  the  things  it  did  not 
know.  Worst  of  all,  it  proclaimed  its  ignorance  as 
the  infallible  and  final  truth,  which  it  was  heresy 
and  spiritual  destruction  to  deny.  Its  arrogance 
has  been  boundless.  It  claimed  at  one  time  to 
have  even  a  special  artistic  inspiration,  which  put 
the  painter  and  sculptor,  in  their  own  depart- 
ment, in  the  second  place  to  the  ecclesiastic.  There 
is  a  Council  decree  on  record  which  declared  that  the 
painter  should  have  to  do  only  with  the  execution 
of  a  picture,  the  holy  fathers  guarding  it  as  their 
province  to  invent  and  dictate !  The  Church  long 
ago  retreated  from  that  position,  but  it  still  fails 
to  see  that  its  right  to  offer  the  world  a  theological 


DOCTRINE  AND  LIFE  115 

cosmogony  is  equally  unfounded.  We  look  to-day 
with  curiosity  on  a  decree  such  as  that  of  the  Council 
of  Carthage,  which  denounced  an  anathema  on 
those  "  who  say  that  man  was  created  mortal, 
and  would  have  died  even  though  he  had  not 
fallen."  But  in  our  churches  we  have  it  still  read 
out  as  a  reason  for  keeping  Sunday,  that  "  in  six 
days  the  Lord  created  the  heavens  and  the  earth." 
That  the  Church  calmly  goes  on  announcing  this 
and  similar  statements,  knowing  that  nobody 
believes  them,  is  one  of  the  religious  dangers  of  our 
time.  To  stake  its  authority  on  declarations 
which  are  not  true,  is  surely  the  best  possible  way 
of  earning  discredit  for  the  part  of  its  teaching 
which  is  true  and  vitally  important. 

But  it  is  time  to  turn  to  some  other  features  of 
our  theme.  In  studying  doctrine  and  life  we 
discern  two  opposing  positions ;  one  in  which 
doctrine  is  above  the  life,  and  the  other  in  which 
life  is  above  the  doctrine.  It  will  be  worth  while 
to  examine  them  both.  Of  the  former  position 
Christianity  offers  us  some  of  the  most  striking 
examples.  It  has  been  one  of  the  constant  re- 
proaches against  the  New  Testament  that  it  offers 
a  rule  of  life  which  is  impossible  and  unreal.  The 
Sermon  on  the  Mount  is,  we  are  told,  not  "  practical 
politics."  It  is  a  dream-legislation,  fitted  for  the 
other  side  of  the  moon  rather  than  for  London  and 
New  York.  But  the  objection  here  is  not  really 
serious.  It  ignores  a  fundamental  law  of  the 
human  spirit.  Humanity  progresses  by  a  series  of 
anticipatory  projections  of  its  highest  self,  which 
itTthen  sets  itself  laboriously  to  realise.  It  sees  its 


116        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

mountain  summit  in  one  glance  of  the  eye.  How 
many  thousand  thousand  movements  of  its  weary 
limbs  will  it  take  to  reach  it  ?  Man  has  ever  been 
flinging  out  his  great  ideals  ;  it  is  the  law  of  his 
nature  to  do  so.  All  the  legislators  have  had 
them.  Plato's  Republic  and  More's  Utopia  have 
never  been  translated  into  act,  but  they  have  been 
an  inspiration  from  one  generation  to  another.  As 
M.  Fouill£e  puts  it :  "  The  ideal  is  but  the  deepest 
sense  and  the  anticipation  of  future  reality." 
The  hitherto  seen  but  unreached  is  surely  coming. 
That  the  New  Testament  life  is  still  floating  as  a 
vision  above  the  world's  practice  is  one  of  its  best 
credentials.  It  is  not  the  opportunist  scheme  of 
a  day,  but  the  prophecy  and  moving  force  of  all 
time.  That  is  an  illuminating  statement  of  Wernle 
where,  dealing  with  the  Early  Church,  he  says  : 
"  From  the  very  first  there  was  a  sharp  distinction 
between  the  Christianity  that  was  actually  lived 
in  the  Churches,  and  the  Christianity  which  the 
teachers  of  the  Church  postulated  in  their  writings. 
That  which  is  called  worldliness  did  not  make  its 
way  into  Christianity  through  decline  from  some 
high  level  of  excellence.  It  came  through  the 
mission  itself  as  each  new  convert  brought  in  a 
portion  of  the  world  along  with  him."  Man's 
doctrine  is  to  his  soul  what  sun  and  sky  are  to  his 
body.  Far  beyond  him  in  the  heavens,  it  is  never- 
theless irreversibly  linked  to  his  destiny.  From 
its  height  it  is  ever  his  nourisher  and  inspirer. 

But  there  is  another  aspect  of  this  disparity 
about  which  a  different  language  has  to  be  held. 
The  one  just  noticed  arises  from  the  human  limi- 


DOCTRINE  AND  LIFEt  117 

tation  and  normal  rate  of  progress.  But  history 
and  contemporary  life  offer  us  the  spectacle  of 
aberrations  which  exhibit  not  so  much  slowness  as 
perversity  ;  where  doctrine  is  used  not  as  a  helper 
of  right  conduct,  but  rather  as  a  substitute  for  it. 
Nowhere  has  human  ingenuity  shown  itself  more 
vividly  or  more  deplorably  than  in  its  exploitation 
of  orthodoxy  in  the  interests  of  immorality.  Man, 
most  amazing  of  creatures,  has  concluded  an  alliance 
between  theft  and  the  creed.  Your  Sicilian  bandit 
will  pistol  you  in  the  name  of  the  Church.  The 
most  entertaining  part  of  the  memoirs  of  that 
scoundrel  of  genius,  Benvenuto  Cellini,  is  the 
description  of  his  pious  raptures,  preceded  and 
followed,  as  if  in  perfect  sequence,  with  the  accounts 
of  his  assassinations  and  debaucheries.  The  fashion 
here  has  been  a  world- wide  one.  Lord  Melbourne, 
on  hearing  a  sermon  which  dealt  closely  with  cha- 
racter, is  reported  to  have  said,  "  No  one  has  a 
more  sincere  respect  for  the  Church  than  I  have, 
but  things  have  come  to  a  pretty  pass  when  religion  is 
allowed  to  invade  the  sphere  of  private  life !  " 
Laurence  Oliphant,  dealing  with  the  financial  crash 
in  New  York  in  1873,  writes  :  "  Founders  of  theo- 
logical seminaries,  secretaries  to  charitable  asso- 
ciations, and  the  leading  elders  of  various  deno- 
minations are  among  the  principal  defaulters.  .  .  . 
There  is  scarcely  an  instance  of  a  prominent  frau- 
dulent bankrupt  who  has  not  made  a  show  of 
piety  the  mask  under  which  he  ensnared  his  victims." 
The  theological  system  which  permits  this  is  near 
its  end.  Nay,  its  day  as  an  effective  force  is  already 
over.  It  is  not  only  dead  but  corrupt,  and  we 


118         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

may  welcome  the  earthquake  which  buries  it  out  of 
sight.  How  heaven-high  above  all  this  is  that 
word  of  neo-platonist  Porphyry,  who  told  the 
Christians  and  non-Christians  of  his  time  that 
"  it  is  a  man's  actions  that  naturally  afford  demon- 
stration of  his  opinions  ;  and  whoever  holds  a  belief 
must  live  in  accordance  with  it,  in  order  that  he 
may  himself  be  a  faithful  witness  to  the  hearers 
of  his  words  !  " 

Let  us  come  now  to  the  opposite  position ;  the 
one,  namely,  where  the  life  is  above  the  professed 
doctrine.  There  are  few  conditions  more  sugges- 
tive than  this,  or  that  contain  more  singular  pro- 
blems. What  society  continually  offers  us  is  the 
spectacle  of  people  owning  a  creed  whose  crudity 
in  parts  revolts  us,  but  whose  nature  reflects  none  of 
this  crudity  ;  whose  life  throughout  is  high  and 
beautiful.  Christianity  has  abounded  in  these 
characters.  What  notions  have  haunted  the  sweet- 
est souls  !  We  think  of  Aquinas,  as  noble  a  man 
as  the  middle  ages  produced,  actually  writing  that 
the  joys  of  the  saints  would  be  augmented  by 
watching  the  tortures  of  the  damned  !  And  in  our 
own  time  Greg's  complaint  that  "  the  Churches 
have  too  generally  proclaimed  a  hell  too  horrible 
to  be  believed  in,  and  a  heaven  too  dull  to  be 
desired,"  has  had  too  abundant  foundation.  The 
ideas  and  the  life  have  been  so  oddly  associated  ! 
Mr.  Moncure  Conway,  in  his  autobiography,  tells 
of  a  negro  woman,  "  Becky,"  "  whose  humour, 
humility,  and  simplicity  and  indefinable  qualities 
that  I  never  knew  in  any  white  person,  made  her 
to  me  a  revelation."  "  Becky "  was  a  devout 


DOCTRINE  AND  LIFE  119 

Methodist,  with  theological  views  that,  stated  on 
paper,  would  have  been  regarded  by  Mr.  Conway 
as  naiTow  indeed.  But  her  religion,  he  assures  us, 
was  delightful. 

What  account  have  we  to  give  of  this  anomaly  ? 
Much  might  be  said,  for  half  the  history  and  the 
mystery  of  human  nature  is  here.  What  these 
stories  show  for  one  thing  is  that  the  unconscious 
in  us  is  so  much  greater  than  the  conscious,  that  the 
unformulated — or  shall  we  say  the  soul  behind  the 
formula  ? — transcends  the  formula  to  so  infinite  a 
degree.  And  it  is  the  soul,  so  essentially  divine 
in  us,  working  behind  the  mere  brain-reasonings, 
that  from  out  of  the  written  creed  has,  with  infallible 
instinct,  selected  and  absorbed  the  essential,  and 
left  the  accidental  and  the  inferior  to  he  on  the 
rubbish-heap  outside.  Men  have  found  their  reli- 
gion as  a  treasure  hid  in  a  field.  The  field  is  wide 
and  weedy,  its  soil  largely  a  poor  soil.  But  the 
treasure  makes  it  an  invaluable  acquisition. 
Schopenhauer  had  all  manner  of  criticisms  of 
Christianity.  But  when  he  declared  that  "  it  was 
reserved  for  Christianity  to  theoretically  formulate 
and  to  expressly  advance  loving-kindness,  not  only 
as  a  virtue,  but  as  queen  of  all,  and  to  extend  it  even 
to  enemies,"  he  had  touched  the  spot.  There  was 
the  treasure.  The  Emperor  Julian,  in  his  sneer 
at  the  Gospel,  said,  "  What  folly  to  erect  fishermen 
into  theologians  !  "  But  there  was  one  thing  about 
the  Galilaean  fisher-theology  which  confounded  him. 
After  hig  attempt  to  produce  a  charitable  move- 
ment in  the  paganism  he  favoured,  he  exclaimed, 
"  It  is  a  scandal  that  the  Galikeans  should  support 


120         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

the  destitute,  not  only  of  their  religion,  but  of 
ours  !  " 

There  the  murder  was  out !  The  creed  of  the 
fishermen  contained  endless  material  for  attack. 
But  this  something  behind,  which  filled  the  people's 
hearts  and  set  them  on  every  deed  of  nobleness  and 
sacrifice,  where  was  the  weapon  that  could  reach 
that  ?  Thus  has  it  ever  been.  The  body  of  reli- 
gion may  change  and  decay,  but  its  soul  ever  lives, 
and  immortally  renews  itself.  Men  formulate  their 
theory  of  Calvary,  of  Atonement ;  they  form  and 
re-form  it.  Meanwhile,  amid  all  the  varying  pre- 
sentments of  it,  the  Cross  draws  men  ;  until  at 
last  it  is  dawning  upon  us  that  it  is  not  the  theories 
at  all  that  have  been  the  attraction,  but  the  treasure 
that  is  hid  deep  in  the  wood  of  Calvary's  tree,  even 
the  love  of  God  which  passe th  knowledge. 

The  subject,  as  thus  passed  under  review,  has 
now  yielded  us  its  main  results.  The  soul  has 
been  in  every  age  the  organ  of  Divine  revelation, 
and  it  is  still  performing  its  function.  The  spiritual 
universe  enlarges  continually  to  our  eye  with  the 
growth  of  our  power  of  vision.  And  as  in  the 
physical  cosmos,  so  in  the  spiritual,  the  change 
of  view  produced  by  our  wider  knowledge  is  a 
change  not  from  greater  to  less,  but  ever  from 
more  to  more. 


XI 
Life's  Accumulations 

THE  cumulative  process  may  be  said  to  be  the 
secret  of  the  universe,  the  plan  on  which  its  whole 
organisation  has  proceeded.  It  was  in  operation 
long  before  we  came  on  the  scene — was,  in  fact, 
the  means  by  which  we  became  possible. 
The  geologic  times  were  times  of  storing.  It  ^ 
took  six  hundred  thousand  years  to  lay  a  coal  bed. 
That  was  Nature's  leisurely  way  of  stocking  our 
cellar.  The  further  man  investigates  his  planet 
the  vaster  becomes  the  inventory  of  this  wonderful 
storehouse.  The  point  to  be  noted  here  is  that  the) 
development  of  the  world's  riches  synchronises  in  a) 
subtle  but  perfectly  exact  way  with  man's  owm 
development.  It  is  precisely  as  he  becomes  ric$ 
inwardly  that  he  becomes  rich  outwardly.  The 
savage  treads  century  after  century  his  wilderness, 
and  remains  a  savage  in  a  wilderness.  The  civilised 
man  comes  along  and  finds  in  the  wilderness  an  El 
Dorado.  The  knowledge  within  him  weds  the 
possibilities  outside  until  it  fills  the  land  with 
wonders.  And  this  process  never  stops.  Man 
finds  the  outside  always  a  match  for  his  inside. 
His  universe  grows  perpetually  with  his  growth, 

121 


122        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

becomes  daily  richer  as  his  mind  is  enriched.  Let 
him  reach  an  archangel's  dimensions,  and  still  his 
cosmic  dwelling-place  will  stretch  beyond  him, 
immeasureable  in  its  immensity,  exhaustless  in  its 
wealth. 

What  we  want  to  deal  with  specially  here,  how- 
ever, is  not  so  much  the  outside  storehouse  as  this 
other  entity  that  stands  over  against  it,  the  human 
soul.  That,  too,  is  a  storehouse  to  whose  contents 
we  are  perpetually  adding.  Life,  as  it  beats  in  our 
brain  and  heart,  is  an  enigma  whose  ultimate  solu- 
tion we  are  never  likely  to  reach  ;  but  we  are,  bit 
by  bit,  picking  up  suggestive  fragments  of  informa- 
tion concerning  it.  On  this  subject  of  accumulation, 
for  instance,  our  age  has  made  a  discovery  of 
vast  significance.  It  is  in  this  respect,  we  find, 
on  another  plane  from  the  accumulations  of  the 
outside  world.  In  that  region — the  region  of 
matter  and  force — the  total  amount  is  always  con- 
stant. You  pile  up  matter  in  one  direction,  you 
diminish  it  to  the  same  extent  in  another.  You 
may  change  your  matter  into  various  forms ; 
you  may  exhibit  your  force  now  as  electricity, 
now  as  heat,  now  as  motion  ;  but  neither  in  the  one 
nor  the  other  will  you  make  any  difference  to  the 
amount.  But  the  scientist  who  reaches  his  cer- 
tainties in  this  sphere  has  no  such  result  to  record 
in  his  analysis  of  life.  Its  laws  are  not  those  of 
either  matter  or  force.  You  cannot  convert  them 
into  it,  or  it  into  them.  Related  to  them  in  a 
thousand  intimate  ways,  using  them  as  its  instru- 
ments, clothing  itself  in  the  garments  they  weave, 
it  is,  nevertheless,  not  of  them.  It  belongs,  so 


LIFE'S  ACCUMULATIONS  123 

science   now   admits,    to   another   sphere,   and   is 
governed  by  other  laws. 

We  can  trace  some  of  its  methods  of  operation 
as  we  feel  our  way  into  this  matter  of  accumulation. 
The  outstanding  feature  at  the  beginning  is  that, 
so  far  as  we  can  ascertain,  there  is  no  limit  to  the 
possible  supply  of  life.  Whence  it  derives  ulti- 
mately we  cannot  say  ;  but  the  source  seems  in- 
exhaustible. The  one  condition  of  its  action — 
a  condition  which  is  frequently  an  impediment 
— is  the  quality  of  the  organ.  But  a  counter- 
balancing point  here,  and  of  the  highest  importance, 
is  that  the  organ  constantly  grows  by  a  proper 
use  of  it.  Function,  the  modern  physiologist  says, 
creates  structure  ;  and  the  higher  the  structure, 
the  richer  the  flow  of  the  life.  The  process  is 
visible  in  every  man  we  meet.  In  all  of  them  the 
inner  life  is  creating  the  outward  structure.  Iri 
the  thinker  the  daily  habit  drives  the  blood  to  the 
brain ;  in  the  blacksmith  the  blood  goes  to  the 
arm  ;  in  the  sensualist  the  blood  feeds  the  stomach 
and  the  rest  of  his  animal  appetites.  And  in  all 
these  directions,  according  as  our  will  directs  the 
flow  of  the  nutrifying  blood,  the  separate  structures 
will  gain  new  powers,  in  which  the  life  will  concen- 
trate itself  ;  in  which  its  resources  will  accumulate 
for  higher  or  lower,  for  good  or  ill.  Development 
of  character,  stated  physiologically,  lies  in  this\ 
that  the  souPs  jnner  motions,  repeated  and  con-^- 
tinued,  tend  to  create  organisms  which  work  with 
an  ever  cumulative  effect. 

Life   as   an   accumulator   works   in   mysterious, 
baffling   ways.     Often   it   will   store   up   for   long 


124        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

antecedent  periods  the  materials  that  are  finally 
to  exhibit  themselves  on  the  great  scale  in  one 
commanding  personality.  It  took  generations  of 
obscure  musicians  to  produce  finally  a  Bach,  a 
Rossini,  a  Beethoven.  The  current  runs  under- 
ground for  far  distances  until  finally  its  hidden 
forces  burst  up  in  some  mighty  geyser-fountain, 
towering  heaven  high.  There  were  generations 
of  Wesleys,  all  full  of  character,  but  when  we 
speak  of  "  Wesley "  we  know  the  one  we  mean. 
Patrick  Bronte,  in  his  gloomy  moorland  parish, 
cherished  a  world  of  thought  and  passion  in  his 
stern,  silent  nature.  It  was  his  daughters  who 
gave  it  vent  in  "  Jane  Eyre  "  and  "  Wuthering 
Heights."  Our  separate  personality  is,  indeed, 
the  greatest  puzzle  in  the  world.  We  can  never 
apportion  its  boundaries  ;  so  little  of  it  is  ours, 
so  much  a  borrowing  from  the  man  before  us. 

Young  children  gather  as  their  own 
The  harvest  that  the  dead  have  sown — 
The  dead,  forgotten  and  unknown. 

But  not  less  striking  is  life's  cumulative  process 
as  seen  in  a  single  career.  Nature  seems  here 
to  proceed  on  a  kind  of  power-grade  system.  She 
allows  us  to  stumble  along  at  a  certain  level  for  a 
time,  longer  or  shorter  according  to  our  diligence 
and  faculty,  and  then,  suddenly  as  it  seems,  lifts 
us  to  another  plane.  She  effects  a  "  remove," 
in  school  phraseology,  to  a  higher  form.  The 
writer  who  has  been  vacillating  from  one  borrowed 
style  to  another,  from  Johnson  to  Stevenson, 
at  last  finds  himself  in  possession  of  one  of  his  own. 


LIFE'S  ACCUMULATIONS  125 

He  has  discovered  himself,  and  that  is  the  moment 
when  the  world  discovers  him.  The  same  thing 
holds  of  the  singer,  the  speaker,  the  scientific  dis- 
coverer. Every  man  who  knows  his  work  and 
faithfully  keeps  him  to  it  is  aware  of  these  Nature- 
promotions.  Are  we  strenuous  and  faithful  ?  We 
shall  hear  from  time  to  time  her  whisper  in  the  ear, 
"  Come  up  higher  !  " 

That  is  by  no  means  the  only  way  in  which  life's 
accumulations  serve  the  worker.  The  true  man 
casts  his  word,  his  deed,  day  by  day,  into  the  hum- 
ming world  outside,  and  finds  afterwards — if  the 
word  be  true  and  the  deed  brave  enough — that 
these  have  become  mighty  co-workers.  His  deed 
of  the  past  is  the  chief  reinforcement  of  the  deed  of 
the  present.  What  he  says  now  is,  may  be,  in  itself 
no  truer  or  stronger  than  what  he  said  twenty  years 
ago,  but  how  much  farther  it  carries  !  The  ancients 
used  to  attach  a  mystic  power  to  certain  names. 
All  their  schemes  of  sorcery  were  built  on  the 
potency  of  names.  In  primitive  religions  the  name 
carried  a  mysterious  relationship  to  the  nature 
and  fortune  of  the  bearer.  To  pronounce  the  name 
of  a  god  or  a  demon  was  to  invoke  an  awesome, 
swiftly-working  power.  These  ideas  were  the 
primitive  clothing  of  a  deep  truth.  We  state  it 
differently  to-day,  but  this  power  of  the  name  is, 
to  us  as  much  as  to  the  ancients,  a  leading  factor 
in  affairs.  It  is  one  of  the  chief  results  of  life's 
cumulative  process.  A  great  name  is  the  concen-l 
tration  of  a  career.  It  is  the  essence  of  a  man's ; 
million  deeds.  As  the  man  stands  there,  a  Welling- 1 
ton  at  Waterloo,  a  Nelson  flying  his  Trafalgar' 


126        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

signal,  he  is,  in  effective  force  upon  his  followers, 
the  man  of  to-day,  plus  all  he  has  been  and  done 
in  ten  thousand  yesterdays,/ 

It  is  time  to  draw  some  lessons  from  this  theme. 
One  is  that  of  the  proper  art  of  accumulating. 
When  we  turn  out  our  rooms,  our  libraries,  we  are 
continually  astonished  at  the  rubbish  we  have 
allowed  to  gather,  rubbish  that  has  crowded  out  so 
much  better  things.  The  life  record  shows  often 
worse  than  that  of  the  rooms.  The  supreme  effort 
here  should  be  to  gather  and  find  house-room  for  the 
best  only.  It  is  thus  we  can  make  life  interesting 
to  the  last  moment.  Some  of  the  chief  occupations 
of  to-day  are  occupations  which  store  nothing. 
What  inner  accumulation  comes  from  spending 
six  nights  in  the  week  at  bridge  ?  There  are  worse 
pursuits  than  this,  whose  storage  department  is  for 
ailments,  diseases,  and  chagrins.  Seneca  in  his 
treatise  on  the  "  Brevity  of  Life  "  bids  us  review 
our  days  and  years  :  "  Say  how  often  you  have 
allowed  them  to  be  stolen  by  a  creditor,  a  mistress, 
a  patron,  a  client ;  how  many  people  have  been 
allowed  to  pillage  your  life  while  you  were  not  even 
aware  you  were  being  robbed  !  "  Diderot  wrote 
on  the  margin  of  his  copy  :  "I  have  never  read 
this  chapter  without  blushing  ;  it  is  my  hjetory." 
It  is  the  history  of  a  good  many  more./^ 

A  scientific  ordering  of  life,  we  repeat,  will  be 
largely  a  science  of  accumulations.  We  shall 
settle  with  ourselves  what  things  are  to  be  sought 
and  retained,  and  what  treated  as  negligible. 
The  strange  thing  is  to  see  the  eagerness  for  lumber. 
Cicero  asks  if  anything  can  be  more  absurd  than, 


LIFE'S  ACCUMULATIONS  127 

in  proportion  as  less  of  our  journey  remains,  to  seek 
a  greater  supply  of  provisions.    And  pagan  Por- 
phyry, a  far  better  Christian,  surely,  than  many  in 
the  Church,  gives  us  the  true  sense  of  the  matter 
in  that  letter  to  his  wife  where  he  bids  her  lay  up 
the  things  that  can  be  carried  into  the  world  beyond, 
instead  of  being  solicitous  about  what  will  have  to 
be  left  behind.    How  striking  is  the  Persian  motto^ 
"  The  bricks  are  made  on  earth  with  which  to  build  | 
our  heavenly  palace  "  ;  and  that  saying  in  the  Lawr 
of   Manu,    "  For   after   death   neither   father,   nor 
mother,  nor  son,  nor  wife,  nor  relatives  are  his 
companions  :  his  virtue  alone  remains  with  him." 
These  souls  of  the  early  world,  seekers  after  God, 
whose    earnestness   shames  our  indifference,    knew 
well  the  lesson  of  our  theme.    They  saw  life  as 
continuous,  death  as  a  liberation,  and  the  realm 
beyond  as  a  sphere  where  the  spiritual  accumu- 
lations  of   the   present   would   be   built   into   the 
structure  of  eternity. 


XII 
Past    and    Present 

IT  is  interesting  to  note  how  the  questions  which 
agitate  religious  minds  to-day  are  related  to  certain 
other  questions  which  lie  deeper  down.  Amongst 
these  "  problems  of  the  rear  "  there  is,  perhaps,  none 
wider  in  its  reach,  or  bearing  more  vitally  upon 
our  other  solutions,  than  that  of  (the  connection 
)  between  past  and  present..  Whatever  be  the  im- 
mediate controversy  in  view,  whether  it  be  the  re- 
vision of  a  creed,  the  observance  of  Sunday,  the 
authority  of  a  Church,  we  see  how  immediately 
and  inevitably  the  modern  mind,  on  its  way  to  a  con- 
clusion, finds  itself  faced  by  this  prior  consideration. 
For  all  these  matters,  we  discover,  resolve  themselves 
into  a  mandate  of  the  past  to  the  present.  The 
Church,  ~tEe  creed,  the  observance  are  the  call 
of  the  past  on  our  obedience.  But  what  is  our 
connection  with  the  past  ?  What  do  we  owe  to  it  ? 
Why  should  we  obey  it  ?  It  is  an  illustration  of 
the  essentially  mystical  nature  of  human  life  that 
such  questions  should  be  possible.  How  destructive 
of  the  commonplace,  of  the  materialistic  idea  of  our 
existence,  if  only  we  come  to  think  of  it,  that  every 
one  of  us  is  at  each  moment,  and  at  each  point  of 

128 


PAST  AND  PRESENT  129 

his  being,  pressed,  magically  wrought  upon,  and 
at  times  completely  enthralled  by  this  invisible 
something,  dead,  we  say,  yet  most  mysteriously 
alive,  which  we  call  the  Past ! 

One  could  well  linger  on  that  side  of  the  theme, 
for  it  is  one  of  infinite  suggestion  ;  but  our  concern 
is  now  with  the  more  practical  aspect  we  have 
raised.  How  stand  we  to-day,  in  matters  of  religion 
and  conduct,  to  the  past  ?  Are  we  its  pupils  or 
its  masters  ?  Is  there  such  a  thing  as  a  possible 
clean  slate,  an  ignoring  of  what  is  gone,  and  an 
absolutely  fresh  start  ?  Or  did  the  world  in  some 
bygone  age  receive  its  marching  orders,  which  are 
valid  for  all  time  ?  We,  of  course,  are  not  the  first 
to  ask  such  questions.  The  eighteenth  century 
rang  with  them.  The  French  Revolution  had  as 
one  of  its  watchwords  the  sovereign  rights  of  the 
present  as  against  all  previous  ages.  "  Death," 
cries  Camille  Desmoulins,  "  extinguishes  all  rights. 
It  is  for  us  who  now  exist,  who  are  now  in  possession 
of  this  planet,  to  give  the  law  to  it  in  our  turn." 
That  is  the  essentially  revolutionary  idea.  It  did 
immense  things  a  hundred  years  ago,  and  it  will  do 
more  yet.  How  vigorous  it  is  in  our  time  and 
amongst  ourselves  is,  perhaps,  nowhere  better 
evidenced  than  in  these  lines  of  William  Watson, 
written  for  Christmas  Day  : 

Fated  among  time's  fallen  leaves  to  stray, 
We  breathe  an  air  that  savours  of  the  tomb, 
Heavy  with  dissolution  and  decay  ; 
Waiting  till  some  new  world-emotion  rise 
And  with  the  shattering  might  of  a  simoom 
Sweep  clear  this  dying  Past  that  never  dies. 

9 


130        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

The  poet  here,  undoubtedly,  interprets  the  secret 
thought  of  many  minds.  It  is  time  clearly  we  all 
of  us,  whether  >  believers  or  non-believers,  set  our- 
selves strenuously  to  the  business  of  ascertaining, 
if  we  can,  our  actual  position  in  regard  to  this 
theme.  It  may  turn  out  that  both  sides,  the  re- 
volutionaries and-  the  conservators,  have  more  to 
say  for  themselves  than  we  have  hitherto  imagined, 
and  that  to  the  final  solution  both  will  be  equal 
contributors. 

On  our  way  to  that  solution  it  has  to  be  noted, 
first  of  all,  that  the  matter  has  a  transcendental 
side,  which  neither  party  can  afford  to  ignore. 
The  modern  mind  is  a  believer  in  progress,  in 
evolution,  and  in  the  consequent  superiority  of 
to-day  over  yesterday.  But  if  we  believe  in  a  God, 
in  a  pre-existent  Absolute  Being,  from  whom  all 
things  have  come,  and  in  whom  all  things  consist, 
we  realise  that  our  notion  of  progress  must  be  a 
purely  relative  one.  (For  there  has  always  been 
something  better  than  our  bestp  The  past  has 
contained  a  quality  of  being  which  has  surpassed 
infinitely  our  greatest  ideas.  If  we  take  the  matter 
on  Spinoza's  lines,  and  think  of  God  as  Eternal 
Substance,  with  the  two  attributes  of  extension 
and  thought,  the  conclusion  is  the  same.  It  is  here, 
indeed,  that  we  reach  that  concept  of  religion 
which  Schleiermacher  has  so  finely  developed  in 
the  "  Reden  "  :  "It  is  the  seeking  and  finding  of 
the  Universal  Being  in  all  that  lives  and  moves,  in  all 
becoming  and  change,  in  all  action  and  suffering. 
It  is  to  have  and  to  know,  in  immediate  feeling, 
life  itself  as  the  infinite  and  eternal  life."  This  sense 


PAST  AND  PRESENT  131 

of  the  transcendency  of  the  Eternal,  as  including 
the  whole  relation  of  past  and  present,  has 
possessed  certain  nations  and  ages  far  more  than 
others.  It  has  been  the  ruling  thought  of  India, 
with  the  result  that  India  is  full  of  metaphysics 
and  has  no  history  ! 

It  is  not,  however,  this  aspect  of  our 
question  which  chiefly  occupies  the  Western 
mind  to-day.  What  men  everywhere  are  demand- 
ing, as  a  matter  of  immediate  practical  moment, 
is  a  statement  of  our  proper  relation,  not 
to  the  metaphysical  but  to  the  historical  past, 
and  of  our  obligations  towards  it.  Have 
the  bygone  ages,  with  their  Scriptures,  their 
creeds,  their  Church  institutions,  any  right  to 
command  us  ?  Must  we  on  the  subjects  they  deal 
with  take  their  view  rather  than  our  own  ?  Are  we 
necessarily  conditioned  by  what  these  people  did  and 
said  ?  Are  we  not  as  good  as  they,  or  better, 
both  for  opinion  and  for  practice  ?  May  we  not 
cut  clear  from  their  tracks,  and  sail  off  on  a  voyage 
of  our  own  ?  Questions  of  this  order,  formulated 
or  unformulated,  in  the  front  of  men's  minds,  or 
lying  away  in  their  brain's  back-chambers,  form 
part  of  the  revolt  of  our  time. 

About  one  part  of  the  answer  there  is  no  doubt. 
So  far  as  the  facts  of  the  past  are  concerned,  there 
is  no  room  for  revolt.  The  facts  are  there,  and  not 
Omnipotence  itself  could  put  them  out  of  the  way. 
And  in  certain  respects  these  facts  are  all-powerful. 
That  the  world  has  come  about  in  such  a  way  as 
it  has  ;  that  history  has  taken  the  course  it  did 
take  ;  that  such  a  thing  as  Christianity,  with  its 


132        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Founder,  its  institutions,  the  beliefs  to  which  it  has 
given  rise,  is  actually  there — these  are  a  piece  of 
the  past  which  no  dialectic,  no  iconoclasm  can  get 
rid  of  if  it  would.  And  none  of  us,  whatever  our 
mental  attitude,  can  for  a  moment  disassociate 
ourselves  from  the  influence  these  facts  exert. 
That  we  are  in  the  twentieth  century  means  there 
are  nineteen  Christian  centuries  behind  us,  every 
one  of  which  is  living  in  our  pulses  to-day.  When 
our  revolutionaries  talk  of  their  "  clean  slate," 
they  need  to  be  reminded  of  these  elementary 
points.  It  is  no  good  quarrelling  with  our  universe. 
It  has  conducted  its  business  after  this  fashion, 
and  will  go  on  doing  it  without  asking  our  leave. 
And  apart  of  its  method  clearly  is  the  enforcement 
upon  the  present  of  this  tremendous  energy  of 
the  actual  past. 

But  here,  upon  the  other  side,  comes  in  a  con- 
sideration which  restores  to  our  revolutionist  a 
great  deal  of  what  he  seems  to  have  yielded.  For 
while  the  past  thus  acts  on  us,  we  with  not  less 
energy,  react  upon  the  past.  The  iacts,  the  things 
that  have  happened  are  there.  /But  the  human 
spirit  has  this  quality,  that  it  can  change  to  an 
./indefinite  degree  its  views  of  them,  the  use  it  makes 
(of  them,  its  whole  attitude  towards  them./  As 
illustration  of  what  we  mean,  take  the  facts. involved 
in  our  modern  geology.  They  were  there  precisely 
as  they  exist  to-day  through  all  the  generations 
of  our  forefathers.  Yet  when  we  consider  the 
elements  involved  here — these  strata,  with  their 
formations,  their  fossils,  the  story  they  contain  in 
their  relation  to  the  human  mind,  may  we  not  say 


PAST  AND  PRESENT  133 

that  the  rocks  themselves,  so  hard  and  stubborn, 
have  to-day  changed  before  our  eyes  !  Certainly 
they  are  no  longer  to  us  what  they  were  to  our 
fathers.  They  are  fitted  into  a  new  frame  ;  they 
recite  a  new  history  ;  they  offer  to  us  a  thousand 
suggestions  of  which  our  fathers  never  dreamed. 
Thus  in  this  sphere  the  past  changes  as  the  mind 
changes.  The  present  is  here  seen  to  control  the 
past  by  touching  it  with  instruments  which  open 
new  meanings. 

It  is  on  precisely  analogous  lines  that  the  mind 
of  to-day  is  proceeding,  in  dealing  with  that  other 
past,  of  the  facts  which  constitute  religious  history. 
It  is  along  this  line  we  discover  that  the  religion] 
of  the  future,  while  absolutely  faithful  to  everything) 
in  the  spiritual  sphere  that  has  happened  on  our; 
planet,  will,  nevertheless,  undergo  as  complete  aj 
transformation    as    geology    has    wrought    in    our) 
science  of  the  rocks.      In  both  instances  we  have  a 
concrete  mass — of  solid  rock  here,  of  solid  history 
there.    In    both    instances    we    have    brought    to 
bear  on  this  concrete  a  magic  of  research,  of  the 
mind's  better  insight,  which  in  the  one  as  in  the 
other  makes  all  things  new.     In  both  realms  the 
whole  question  is,  we  see,  of  the  interpretation  of 
our  facts,  of  the  use  we  make  of  them,  of  the  cosmic 
framework  into  which  we  fit  them. 

It  is  at  this  point  we  have  finally  to  recognise, 
with  our  revolutionary,  that  the  present  is,  indeed, 
master  of  the  past,  and  not  its  slave.  The  prophetic 
minds  have  ever  gone  on  this  assumption.  It  was 
the  attitude  of  Jesus.  (He  was  crucified  for  being 
a  Revolutionary,  for  believing  that  there  was  a 


134        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

greater  inspiration  living  then  in  His  soul  than  was 
i  to  be  found  in  any  old-world  writings.  The 
orthodoxy  of  the  day  pored  over  the  scrolls  of  the 
synagogue  as  the  only  authentic  message  from  the 
heavens^/  The  Man  of  Nazareth,  with  His  "  But  I 
say  unto  you,"  instead  proclaimed  for  ever  the  rights 
of  progressive  revelation,  jit  is  precisely  as  men 
have  followed  Him  here,  precisely  as  they  have 
^/  caught  the  new  note  for  their  time,  and  fearlessly 
uttered  it,  that  they  have  become  of  use  to  their 
generation,  l^hey  were  here  witnessing  to  that 
supremest  of  all  truths  for  us,  that  God's  book  of 
life  is  for  ever  in  the  making,  and  is  by  no  means 
finished  yet. 

It  is  on  this  view  of  the  right  relations  of  past  and 
present  that  our  whole  religious  thought  in  the 
future  must  proceed.  When  Pascal  declared  that 
the  human  race  was,  in  its  totality,  as  an  individual, 
ever  growing  and  ever  learning,  he  uttered  a  truth 
whose  implications  went  further  probably  than  even 
he  himself  perceived.  For  it  proclaims  the  newest 
mind  as>ever  the  oldest  and  the  most  experienced 
mind.  The  race  is  older  with  each  generation, 
and  knows  more.  And  its  new  knowledge  is  always 
a  fresh  chapter  of  the  human  Scripturey  When 
men  generally  have  perceived  this  there  will  be 
surcease  for  ever  of  the  pitiful  spectacle  of  religious 
minds  tormenting  themselves  and  others  with 
notions  of  God,  man  and  the  future  derived  from  the 
childhood  of  the  world.  It  will  be  seen  that  we  are 
on  an  ascending  scale  of  height  and  vision,  and  that 
the  view  open  to  us  is  more  trustworthy  than  that 
of  men  for  their  time  truly  inspired,  but  who  his- 


PAST  AND  PRESENT  135 

torically  and  evolutionarily  were  lower  down  on  the 
road.  The  past  is  ours  not  for  our  enslavement, 
but  for  our  use,  for  our  learning,  for  means  of  con- 
quering a  vaster  future.  No  less  than  this  is  in- 
volved hi  our  belief  hi  God  the  Living  Spirit.  With 
Vinet  we  hold  that  "  the  Reformation  is  ever  per- 
manent hi  the  Church  even  as  Christianity.  It  is 
Christianity  restoring  itself  by  its  own  inherent 
strength.  So  that  even  to-day  the  Reformation 
is  still  a  thing  to  be  done,  a  thing  ever  to  be  re- 
commenced, and  for  which  Luther  and  Calvin  only 
prepared  a  smoother'and  broader  way." 


XIII 
When  it  is  Heaven 

LAMB,  writing  to  Wordsworth,  on  receiving  from 
the  poet  a  copy  of  his  just  issued  "  Excursion," 
declared  the  reading  of  it  had  given  him  "  a  day 
of  Heaven."  There  may  have  been  a  friendly 
exaggeration  in  the  words,  but,  all  the  same,  one 
reads  them  with  pleasure.  That  such  words  are 
in  the  language  is  in  itself  suggestive.  Their  sig- 
nificance deepens  when  we  remember  that  they 
stand  for  a  truth,  for  a  valid  experience.  This 
word  "  heaven  "  has  been  coined  out  of  human 
life.  It  would  never  have  been  here  apart  from 
what  men  have  felt  and  seen.  In  its  religious  use 
it  points  mainly  to  transcendental  ideas,  to  a  world 
beyond  this  ;  but  it  would  be  entirely  without 
meaning  were  it  not  for  things  we  know  of  the 
life  here  and  now.  Men  believe  in  a  heaven  yonder 
because  they  have  already  found  a  heaven  closer 
at  hand.  They  remember  elect  times  when  _the 
consciousness  has  been  lifted  to  its  highest,  when 
the  soul  has  tasted  its  noblest  satisfactions,  and 
has  revelled  in  the  bliss  of  the  good  and  of  the 
beautiful.  With  some  these  moments  are  too  few  ; 
to  some  they  come  never  at  all.  Faust,  in  one  of 

136 


WHEN  IT  IS  HEAVEN  137 

the  scenes  with  Mephistopheles,  is  willing  to  wager 
his  soul  if  the  tempter  can  procure  him  a  moment 
of  which  he  can  really  say,  "  Verweile  dock,  du  bist 
so  schon."  He  is  sure  there  is  no  moment  so  perfect 
that  he  could  wish  it  to  stay.  But  Faust  was  in  a 
bad  state.  There  are  myriads  of  such  moments  ; 
and  when  our  race  has  developed  further  towards 
its  true  dimensions  and  its  true  goal  there  will  be 
myriads  more.  That  man  has  reached  thejdea  of 
all  this,  that  he  has  had  fleetingest  sense  of  his  true 
joy  is  a  pledge  of  what  is  to  come.  It  is  the  sailor's 
glimpse  from  the  wave  top  ;  a  vision  of  land  which 
no  subsequent  tossings  or  fog  bewilderments  can 
henceforth  disprove. 

It  is  the  healthiest  of  exercises  to  turn  the  mind 
to  this  side  of  its  experiences.  "  Life  is  twice 
lived,"  says  the  Roman  poet,  "  in  the  enjoyment 
of  our  past."  The  sunshine  of  those  soul-festivals 
will  irradiate  the  darkest  sky,  and  give  it  promise  of 
better  to-morrows.  As  we  look  back  we  realise 
through  what  different  gateways  our  heaven  has 
opened  upon  us.  How  often,  to  begin  with,  has 
njiture  filled  us  to  the  very  full !  There  are  diviner 
scenes  on  this  earth  than  any  apocalypse  has 
pictured.  And  the  remembrance  comes  back  to 
us  of  the  rapture  beyond  words  with  which  we  have 
gazed  upon  them.  The  present  writer  can  never 
forget  the  sensations  of  one  summer  day  when, 
solitary  amongst  the  mountains  of  the  Grisons, 
he  was  held  as  in  a  trance  by  the  scene  before  him. 
The  magical  hues  of  the  atmosphere  playing  over 
the  far-stretched  valleys  and  lower  heights,  the 
blue  of  the  cloudless  sky,  the  hush  upon  all  nature 


138        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

seemed  supernatural ;  while  the  vista  of  mighty 
peaks,  virginal  in  their  snowy  whiteness,  soaring 
into  the  very  heavens,  seemed  visibly  to  link  our 
world  to  a  faker  universe  beyond.  One  had  seen  the 
mountains  before  ;  for  years  the  view  of  them  had 
daily  fed  the  eye,  but  never  before  or  since  has 
there  been  in  contemplation  of  them  such  a  quality 
of  feeling.  <lt  was  as  though  the  utmost  essence 
of  all  that  was  beautiful  had  suddenly  passed  into 
the  soul^.  There  was  nothing  for  it  but  worship. 
It  was  heaven. 

At  other  times  the  soul  reaches  these  heights  in 
human  fellowship.  There  has  been  nothing  more 
lovely  in  history,  and  nothing  more  potent,  than 
those  groups  and  circles  of  eager  souls,  that  in  every 
age  have  formed 'round  some  great  spirit^  athirst 
for  the  truth  and  grace  it  distilled.  That  is  why 
men  left  home  and  business  for  the  society  of  Jesus. 
To  follow  Him  was  the  divinest  of  luxuries.  In 
this  fellowship  men  tasted  life's  choicest  fruit- 
Fed  with  such  words,  such  tones,  their  inmost 
nature  vibrating  with  such  harmonies,  men  felt 
that  poverty,  homelessness,  persecution,  were  no 
hardship.  They  tasted  through  all  that  inner  joy 
which,  as  Matthew  Arnold  has  it,  overflowed  upon 
the  world  and  was  their  secret  of  its  conquest.  It 
has  always  been  so.  In  every  age  we  see  the 
mysterious  attraction,  surpassing  all  others,  of  the 
prophet  and  his  circle.  Now  it  is  Origen,  whose 
disciples  declare  that  in  his  presence  there  is  "  per- 
petual sunlight,"  and  "  the  inspiration  of  divine 
things  "  ;  later  it  is  Bernard  fleeing  into  the  wil- 
derness, pursued  by  young  knights,  who  give  up 


WHEN  IT  IS  HEAVEN  139 

arms  and  the  world  for  his  society  ;  again  it  is 
Francis  at  Assisi,  making  men  realise  that  absolute 
poverty,  plus  his  companionship,  was  a  wealth 
beyond  that  of  pope  or  emperor.  It  is  under  the 
same  instinct  that  further  on  in  those  mediaeval 
times  we  have  formed  the  Gottesfreunde,  circles  of 
brethren  who,  outside  the  ceremonies  of  the  popular 
religion,  seek  together  for  deeper  spiritual  realisa- 
tions. The  Methodist  circles  with  their  marvellous 
store  of  ecstatic  feeling  are  the  Gottesfreunde  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  Under  far  different  circum- 
stances, but  illustrating  the  same  instinct,  is  that 
circle  at  La  Chenaie,  where  Lamennais  gathers 
around  him  in  religious  retreat  such  choice  spirits 
as  Maurice  de  Guerin,  Rohrbacher,  Montalembert, 
and  Lacordaire.  And  not  only  has  it  been  among 
the  elite  that  exquisite  emotion  of  this  kind  has 
been  known.  In  humble  gatherings  of  unnoted 
men  and  women,  in  conventicles  and  bare  rooms, 
the  heart  has  been  caught  by  the  Spirit's  deepest 
tides,  and  unspeakable  things  realised.  "  This  is 
heaven,"  has  been  the  common  thought.  The 
experience  of  these  people  has  borne  witness  to 
the  great  saying  of  Hegel  in  his  "  Philosophy  of 
Religion  "  :  "  All  the  various  peoples  feel  that  it  is 
in  the  religious  consciousness  they  possess  truth,  and 
they  have  always  regarded  religion  as  constituting 
their  true  dignity  and  the  Sabbath  of  their  life." 

It  is  along  lines  that  are  strictly  parallel  with 
the  religious  consciousness,  though  not  generally 
regarded  as  immediately  connected  with  it,  that  the 
mind  finds  other  experiences  that  give  it  the  noblest 
expansions.  One  of  these  is  great  music.  We  are 


140         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE, 

not  at  the  bottom  yet  of  all  the  soul's  subtle  alliances. 
We  are  sure,  however,  that  harmony,  as  it  expresses 
itself  in  sound,  is  flesh  and  blood  relation  to  what- 
soever is  highest  in  us.  Plato  saw  this  when  he 
associated  music  so  closely  with  education  in 
virtue.  Browning  has  put  it  all  into  three  lines 
where,  in  "  Pauline,"  he  speaks  of 

Music,  which  is  earnest  of  a  heaven, 
Seeing  we  know  emotions  strange  by  it, 
Not  else  to  be  revealed. 

Who  that  has  heard  the  great  Fribourg  organ,  or 
sat  at  the  feet  of  Joachim,  or  listened  (as  we  did 
once  in  boyhood — enraptured  hour  !)  to  Thalberg, 
but  has  felt  at  moments  that  this  too  was  heaven, 
the  heart's  heaven,  filled  to  the  full  so  that  it  could 
hold  no  more  ! 

I$ut  often  man's  heaven  reaches  him  without  any 
external  aids  whatever.  It  comes  to  him  sometimes 
in  dreams.  There  are  experiences  here,  at  rare 
intervals  it  may  be,  of  a  feeling  so  intense  and  so 
exquisite  as  to  make  the  waking  a  kind  of  expulsion 
from  Paradise.  Where  and  what  is  that  realm 
we  have  left  ?  Is  it  less  real  that  we  saw  it  with 
another  eye  than  this  in  its  socket  ?  Some  have 
had  these  dreams  in  their  waking  hours  ;  as  Jacob 
Boehme,  in  that  "  Sabbath  of  the  Soul  "  which  he 
describes  as  lasting  seven  days,  when  he  was  "  as  it 
were  inwardly  surrounded  by  a  Divine  light,"  and 
when  "  the  triumph  that  was  in  my  soul  I  can 
neither  tell  nor  describe  "  ;  or  as  Plotinus,  who 
speaks  of  being  caught  up  into  an  immediate  con- 
tact with  God ;  or  Philo,  who,  when  "  coming 


WHEN  IT  IS  HEAVEN  141 

to  his  work  empty  suddenly  became  full,  ideas 
being  invisibly  showered  upon  him  and,  as  it  were, 
implanted  in  him  from  on  high  "  ;  or  that  sudden 
vision  of  the  American  doctor  of  whom  Professor 
James  speaks,  who  "  saw  that  the  universe  is  not 
composed  of  dead  matter,  but  is,  on  the  contrary, 
a  living  Presence,  that  all  men  are  immortal,  and 
that  the  cosmic  order  is  such  that  all  things  work 
together  for  the  good  of  each  and  all." 

But  there  is  more.  Surely  the  crowning  wonder 
is  when  men,  and  weak  women,  have  found  heaven 
in  the  midst  of  cruellest  sufferings  and  approaching 
death  !  We  with  our  comfort  standard,  with  our 
income  and  four  meals  a  day  as  the  essentials 
of  well  being,  find  that  story  of  the  martyrs  almost 
psychologically  impossible.  And  yet  it  is  true. 
We  have  their  inner  mind  in  their  own  words. 
Here  is  Perpetua,  the  young  mother,  at  Carthage, 
who,  when  lodged  in  the  horrible  prison,  writes  : 
"  The  gaol  became  to  me  suddenly  a  palace,  so  that  I 
liked  better  to  be  there  than  anywhere  else."  She 
writes  up  her  diary  to  the  night  before  her  delivery 
to  the  wild  beasts,  closing  it  thus  :  "  This  is  what 
I  have  done  up  to  the  day  before  the  sports  :  how 
the  sports  themselves  will  go  let  someone  else  write 
if  he  pleases."  Men  have  felt  the  goodness  of  God 
while  actually  burning.  We  read  of  Fructuosus 
in  the  Valerian  prosecution  calling  out  to  his  brethren} 
from  the  flames  :  "  The  kindness  of  the  Lord  can 
never  fail,  either  here  or  hereafter.  This  which 
you  see  is  but  the  weakness  of  an  hour."  The 
greatest  refutation  of  pessimism  is  surely  the  story 
of  the  world's  sufferings. 


The  world's  history  is  then,  we  see,  full  of  sublime 
realisations,  wrought  out  of  all  kinds  of  material, 
entering  the  soul  through  the  most  opposite  roads. 
As  we  study  them  they  suggest  to  us  irresistibly 
certain  questions.  CAre  such  times — the  heart's 
triumphant  hours — on  the  increase  among  us  ?) 
Are  they  to  be  looked  for  and  worked  for,  as  life's 
normal  and  legitimate  products  ?  And  is  the  mode 
of  life  to-day  the  best  calculated  to  develop  them  ? 
About  one  thing  we  may  feel  sure.  The  way  of  the 
true  life  lies  always  in  the  direction  of  these  ex- 
periences. The  world's  real  wealth  is  a  wealth 
of  the  nobler  feeling  and  of  the  conditions  and 
opportunities  for  it.  And  man  is  meant  for  these 
things.  He  is  made  for  his  heaven.  Any  road  that 
leads  away,  any  method  of  living  that  dulls  the 
appetite  and  clogs  the  capacity  for  these  states  of 
the  soul,  is  to  be  avoided  as  a  road,  a  method  of 
death. 

If  that  be  so,  what  shall  we  say  of  our  own  time  ? 
To  judge  by  much  we  see,  the  twentieth  century 
might  appear  in  this  matter  to  be  trying  its  hardest 
to  contradict  the  verdict  of  history  and  of  the 
nature  of  things.  \It  is  trying  after  a  heaven  for 

!the  body  rather  than  for  the  soul^  It  spends 
so  much  time  and  labour  over  the  preparation  for 
living  that  it  has  none  left  for  life  itself.  JVTillion- 
aires  are  building  palaces,  and  forgetting  that 
these  caravanserais  can  never  exhale  the  perfume 
of  a  home.'-  They  are  consumed  with  the  passion 
for  dollars,  as  if  dollars  could  breed  either  great 
ideas  or  noble  emotions.  There  are  multitudes 
\whose  heaven  is  frankly  sensual.  Their  paradise 


WHEN  IT  IS  HEAVEN  143 

is  an  orgie.  The  world  ought  by  this  time  to  know 
better.  That  way  has  been  so  often  tried  and 
always  with  one  result.  What  a  sensualist  once 
said  to  the  present  writer  is  so  universally  true. 
"It  all  becomes  very  disgusting  after  a  time." 
It  is  a  profound  student  of  human  nature  who 
observes  on  this  point :  "  We  find  as  man  grows 
more  civilised  (he  might  have  said  spiritualised) 
sexual  love  assumes  ever  less  value  in  his  eyes  if 
there  go  not  with  it,  if  there  do  not  precede,  accom- 
pany,  and  follow  it  the  emotions  built  up  of  our 
thoughts  and  feelings,  of  our  sweetest  and  tenderest 
hours  and  years." 

No.  The  way  to  the  human  heaven  is  not  by 
following  the  animal  in  us,  but  rather  by  the  extri- 
cation of  ourselves  from  it.  It  is  a  foundation 
to  build  from,  not  a  house  to  live  in.  We  are 
here  to  grow  the  soul  in  us,  a  soul  worthy  of  the 
heaven  above  and  around,  which  waits  to  reveal 
itself  to  us. 

It  is  precisely  as  the  soul  thus  grows,  and  finds 
in  this  world  its  ethereal  food,  that  it  becomes  sure 
of  the  other  heaven.  It  is  with  such  natures, 
that  with  the  passing  years,  the  certitude  increases 

that 

This  life  of  mortal  breath 

Is  but  a  suburb  of  the  life  Elysian, 

Whose  portal  we  call  Death. 


XIV 
Fatigue 

FATIGUE,  we  are  beginning  to  discover,  is  one  of  the 
first-class  themes  in  modern  life.  It  is  an  affair 
not  simply  of  medicine  and  hygiene,  but  of  morals, 
of  philosophy,  of  religion — in  fact,  of  the  entire 
human  welfare.  A  new  psychology  is  arising, 
destined  to  profoundly  alter  our  whole  perspective, 
a  psychology  which  deduces  the  conditions  of  right 
living  from  a  rigorous  and  scientific  observation  of 
the  facts  and  laws  in  our  mental  life.  And  this 
psychology  is  paying  special  attention  to  the  phe- 
nomena of  fatigue.  It  is  studying  its  relation  to 
the  various  features,  not  only  of  our  physical, 
but  also  of  our  mental  and  moral  life.  We  find  there 
is  an  ethic  of  fatigue,  almost  a  religion  of  it.  In 
that  reconstruction  of  the  ethical  and  religious  idea 
which  is  arising  out  of  a  clearer  knowledge  of  the 
contents  of  consciousness,  this  subject  will  occupy 
a  foremost  place. 

What  is  fatigue  ?  It  is  curious  how  hazy  the 
average  notion  is.  We  know  it  as  a  phase  of  feeling 
associated  with  certain  physical  states.  When  by 
walking,  singing,  hammering,  or  other  exercises, 
the  muscles  and  nerves  employed  have  given  off 

144 


FATIGUE  146 

a  certain  amount  of  energy,  the  fact  is  registered 
on  our  consciousness,  and  we  say  we  are  tired.  But 
the  feeling  here  is  one  thing,  and  the  condition 
another.  The  whole  of  the  body  is  working,  per- 
petually giving  off  energy.  But  it  is  only  a  portion 
of  the  body  that  produces  fatigue  as  a  sensation. 
The  blood  circulates,  the  heart  performs  its  rhythmic 
motion,  the  liver  secretes,  the  cells  in  their  myriads 
form  and  reform,  and  all  this  without  sense  of 
weariness.  Fatigue,  as  felt,  belongs  purely  to  the 
voluntary  nerves  and  muscles. 

Fatigue  is  an  affair  of  life,  of  sentient  beings. 
There  is  no  tiredness  in  the  universe.  Its  sum  of 
infinite  energy  continues  from  age  to  age  its  stupend- 
ous, complicated  movement,  without  trace  of 
exhaustion.  We  may  speak  of  a  wearing  down 
here  and  there.  Steel,  by  use,  becomes  tired  and 
loses  its  edge.  It  will  regain  it  by  rest.  The  sun, 
which  is  now  computed  to  be  at  a  temperature  of 
three  million  degrees  Fahrenheit,  or  fourteen  thou- 
sand times  hotter  than  boiling  water,  may  be  ex- 
hausting its  heat,  but  that  is  only  to  have  it  stored 
in  another  form  elsewhere.  The  cosmos  as  a  whole, 
amid  eternal  change,  retains  eternal  freshness. 
How  purely  local  and  personal  is  the  idea  of  fatigue 
may  be  realised  when  we  remember  that  the  body 
of  the  most  weary  mortal  on  the  planet  at  this 
moment  is,  as  to  its  every  particle,  one  with  a 
universe  that  is  of  everlasting  strength.  His 
body  in  one  sense  is  no  more  tired  than  Mont  Blanc 
or  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  The  fatigue  here  is  really 
a  phase  of  consciousness,  a  danger  signal  giving 
notice  of  a  physical  condition  requiring  readjustment. 

10 


146        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

The  inner  life,  which  modern  science  now  recognises 
as  distinct  from  energy,  requires  a  full  complement 
of  this  energy,  stored  in  the  nerve  and  muscular 
centres,  as  the  condition  of  its  proper  action,  and 
the  sense  of  fatigue  is  the  warning  bell  rung  in  the 
brain  when  that  store  has  been  unduly  diminished. 
But  this  is  not  the  end  of  the  analysis.  That 
oneness  of  mind  and  body  which  Spinoza  placed  at 
the  foundation  of  his  philosophy  is  being  reaffirmed 
in  new  ways  by  modern  science.  We  see  how  in  a 
thousand  directions  mental  life  plays  into  the 
bodily  and  bodily  life  into  the  mental.  Every 
physical  condition  repeats  itself  in  the  mind's 
sensation  ;  every  feeling  and  thought  of  the  mind 
reacts  immediately  upon  the  body.  Henle's 
researches  show  that  joyful  emotions  quicken  the 
respiration  and  make  the  circulation  freer.  The 
depressing  emotions,  like  sorrow  and  fear,  contract 
the  arterial  and  bronchial  muscles  and  so  dis- 
tinctly interfere  with  both  circulation  and  breathing. 
A  bright,  inspiring  thought  is  the  finest  of  all 
physicians,  whose  medicine  is  working  on  every 
organ  and  every  cell  of  our  bodily  system  and 
arming  it  with  a  new  power  of  life.  But  not  less 
true  and  important  is  the  obverse  side,  that  the 
physical  conditions  exert  their  full  influence  upon 
the  mental  and  the  moral  states.  It  is  this  side 
of  the  matter  that  the  new  psychology  is  specially 
investigating,  with  results  that  must  tell  to  a 
momentous  degree  on  our  entire  ethical  and  religious 
outlook. 

It   has    shown,    for   instance,    with   an    almost 
mathematical  precision,  that  over-fatigue,  exhaus- 


FATIGUE  147 

tion  of  the  nerve-centres,  means  for  the  time  being 
a  lowering  of  status  of  the  entire  inner  man.  In 
this  condition  his  perceptions  are  less  clear,  his 
memory  is  defective,  and,  most  of  all,  his  volition 
faculty  is  weakened.  It  is  precisely  when  the  nerve 
forces  are  at  low  ebb  that  impulses  of  the  animal 
nature,  kept  down  and  out  of  sight  by  the  higher 
interests  of  the  normal  manhood,  are  apt  to  rush 
in  upon  the  consciousness  and  endanger,  sometimes 
to  the  wreckage  point,  the  entire  moral  fabric.  If 
the  cases  could  be  traced  where  men  of  former 
repute  have  made  shipwreck  of  character,  it  would 
be  found  in  a  vast  number  of  instances  that  they 
coincided  with  a  period  of  overstrain,  in  which  the 
physical  reserve  balance  had  been  drained  away. 
And  where  matters  have  not  reached  this  extremity, 
yet  what  minor  catastrophies  have  they  to  account 
for  !  A  domestic  explosion  which  breaks  the  peace 
of  a  household,  and  for  weeks,  may  be,  glooms 
and  shadows  two  lives,  as  often  as  not  means  simply 
that  a  tired  husband  at  the  end  of  his  day  has  met 
a  tired  wife,  and  that  a  single  spark  lighting  on 
two  overstrained  nerve-systems  has  set  both  ablaze. 
And  that  is  not  all,  or,  perhaps,  even  the  worst. 
It  is  bad  enough  to  note  the  evil  to  which  fatigue 
may  introduce  us  ;  to  realise,  as  Hesiod  ages  ago 
put  it,  that  then  "  vice  may  be  found  easily ; 
that  her  way  is  smooth  and  her  dwelling-place 
near."  Quite  as  serious  a  consideration  is  the 
higher  life  interests  against  which  a  constant  over- 
strain bars  the  door.  The  things  which  make  a 
man's  career  great,  the  things  to  see,  to  think  and 
to  do,  are  possible  only  to  his  days  of  power.  It 


148        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

is  when  our  nature  is  full  to  overflowing  that  the 
supreme  visions  come.  It  is  then  we  get  lifts  of 
insight  which  show  us  a  self  beyond  our  self.  It 
is  then  that  men  plan  their  daring  deed,  the  seeming 
impossible  enterprise  which,  achieved,  becomes 
history.  The  orator  magnetises  his  audience  by 
his  overflow  ;  when  his  life  fountain  can  water  not 
his  own  soul  only,  but  a  thousand  others.  As  we 
realise  all  this  we  may  say  with  Voltaire,  though  in 
a  new  sense,  "  Le  superflu,  chose  si  necessaire." 

With  this  exposition  we  may  come  now  to  some 
practical  considerations.  One  is  the  scientific  con- 
demnation of  asceticism  as  an  aid  to  the  nobler  life. 
By  that,  of  course,  we  do  not  mean  the  control  and 
severest  discipline  of  the  animal  nature.  There 
science  and  the  New  Testament  are  at  one.  But 
the  mediaeval  religion  of  fasts  and  flagellations  and 
bodily  emaciation  generally  in  the  supposed  inter- 
ests of  sainthood,  a  religion  which  in  many  circles 
still  survives,  is  by  the  new  psychology  proved  a 
false  one.  Some  of  the  noblest  men  the  world  has 
seen  have  been  martyrs  to  its  delusion.  What  a 
picture  is  that,  drawn  for  us  by  his  biographer, 
of  Pope  Gregory  the  Great,  who,  brought  by  his 
austerities  to  such  a  pass  that  throughout  his 
pontificate  he  was  never  a  day  without  pain,  tran- 
sacted his  world-business,  wrote  his  letters,  com- 
posed his  treatises,  and  gave  his  instructions  in 
music  lying  on  a  couch  because  he  was  unable  to 
stand  or  sit !  The  story  is  similar  of  Bernard,  of 
St.  Francis,  of  a  host  of  noble  souls  of  that  time. 
How  much  greater  had  they  been,  and  happier,  could 
they  have  seen,  as  we  now  do,  that  the  soul's 


FATIGUE  149 

% 

inspirations,  the  mind's  thinking,  the  will's  reso- 
lutions, are  at  their  mightiest  when  the  physical 
states  are  at  their  best ;  that  the  culture  of  the  body 
is  an  integral  part  of  the  religious  life  ! 

But  the  subject  has  more  than  an  individual 
reference.  There  is  discernible  in  history  such  a 
thing  as  a  fatigue  of  races.  A  population  over- 
driven by  labour,  or  exhausted  by  its  passions,  will 
become  old  and  decrepit  before  its  time.  To  keep 
a  nation  young  is  the  highest  task  of  social  economy, 
and  that  can  only  be  achieved  by  knowledge  of  the 
whole  complex  law  of  living.  And  that  is  much 
more  than  a  physical  law.  A  people's  entire  soul 
may  become  fatally  fatigued  by  the  limitation  of 
its  interests.  Vice  limits  the  human  interests  to 
a  few  things — the  lowest  things.  The  soul,  worked 
incessantly  on  this  one  level,  becomes  mortally 
weary,  to  the  hating  of  its  life.  That  was  the  secret 
of  the  Roman  decadence.^  In  Matthew^Arnold's 

words: 

On  that  hard  pagan  world  disgust 

And  secret  loathing  fell ; 
Deep  weariness,  and  sated  lust, 

Made  human  life  a  hell. 

What  a  spectacle  is  that  of  the  later  Rome  which 
we  get  in  the  pages  of  Cassiodorus,  when  the  ener- 
vated population,  forgetful  of  their  mighty  ancestors, 
were  to  the  vigorous  Gothic  race  who  ruled  them, 
as  the  Greeks  became  later  to  their  masters  the 
Turks  ! 

It  is  plain,  then,  that  as  individuals  and  as  a 
people  we  need  a  philosophy  and  a  religion  of 
fatigue  and  of  rest.  When  our  activities  go  beyond 


150        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

their  limit ;  when  we  work  not  from  our  overflow, 
but  from  the  dregs  of  our  vitality  ;  when  we  keep 
going,  not  by  sleep  and  rest,  but  by  the  stimulant 
and  the  spur,  we  are  sinning  against  the  whole 
Decalogue  of  life.  If  we  would  see  our  highest, 
we  must  limit  the  output.  We  must  never  let  work 
choke  our  top  springs.  For  joy  is  not  only  our 
heritage  ;  it  is  our  duty.  "  La  joie  de  V esprit," 
said  Ninon,  "  en  marque  la  force."  We  want  gladness 
enough,  not  only  to  flood  our  own  life,  but  to  flow 
over  perpetually  upon  our  neighbour.  And  there 
is  no  gladness  in  exhaustion.  The  highest  philosophy 
of  living  is  to  work  as  the  universe  works,  and  to 
rest  as  it  rests.  We  want  to  catch  for  ourselves 
the  secret  of  that  mighty  cosmic  rhythm  ;  to  catch 
the  secret  of  its  storing  and  of  its  giving  forth  of 
energy  ;  of  its  repose  and  its  multitudinous  motion. 
The  universe  finds  its  rest  in  the  interplay  of  a 
myriad  of  interests.  That  is  how  we  shall  find  ours. 
The  wider  the  keyboard  the  less  strain  on  this 
note  and  that.  The  vaster  the  music  we  make 
the  longer  will  the  instrument  last. 


XV 
Of  Moral  Stimulants 

AT  certain  seasons  of  the  year  London  exhibits 
on  a  great  scale  the  phenomenon  of  gregarious 
religion.  Its  public  halls  are  in  requisition  day  by 
day  for  crowded  assemblies,  met  there  to  be  played 
upon  by  orators.  There  is  an  orgy  of  speech,  of 
song,  of  excited  feeling.  People  come  up  to  the 
gatherings  from  town  and  country  to  be  "  stimu- 
lated." Where  the  rhetoric  is  unusually  fervid 
the  stimulus  becomes  an  intoxication,  which  is  felt 
to  be  better  still.  After  a  sufficiently  long  course 
of  these  exercises,  mind  and  body  have  a  sensation 
resembling  that  of  waking  after  a  debauch.  But 
people  recover  easily — their  constitutions  are  well 
seasoned — and  the  world  goes  on  as  before. 

These  gatherings  are,  we  say,  an  excellent 
illustration  of  the  action  of  moral  stimulants,  a 
subject  about  which  neither  the  Church  nor  society 
in  general  has  as  yet  thought  sufficiently.  And 
there  is  no  topic  about  which  there  is  greater  need 
of  clear  thinking,  because,  both  by  its  uses  and  its 
abuses,  the  moral  stimulant  is  at  every  moment 
acting  on^the  community's  most  vital  parts.  We 
need  to  have  first  a  proper  idea  of  what  a  stimulant 

151 


152        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

is.  In  relation  to  the  body  we  are  using  the  term 
continually  in  a  restricted  and  somewhat  sinister 
application.  In  this  department  of  things  the 
"  stimulant  "  is  getting  a  bad  name.  We  think 
naturally  of  alcohol,  of  drugs,  of  the  spur,  of  some- 
thing which  makes  a  man  feel  stronger  at  the 
moment  than  he  really  is,  and  which  results  as 
surely  in  a  corresponding  diminution  of  vital 
power.  If  this  were  the  sole  range  of  action  of  the 
stimulant,  and  if  the  parallel  held  strictly  in  the 
sphere  of  morals  and  religion,  we  should  indeed 
have  here  an  indictment  of  some  gravity  against 
certain  areas  of  religious  activity. 

But  such  a  conception  of  the  stimulant  would  be 
an  entirely  erroneous  one.  There  is,  of  course, 
an  unhealthy  action,  physical  and  moral,  of  which 
we  shall  have  more  to  say  ;  but  what  is  first  to  be 
considered  is  the  fact  that  in  the  overwhelming 
majority  of  instances  the  action  of  the  stimulus 
is  natural  and  wholesome.  Our  entire  constitution, 
physical  and  moral,  is  constructed  with  a  view  to 
the  stimulant.  The  whole  muscular  system,  backed 
by  the  subtler  one  of  the  nerves,  is  worked  in  this 
way.  We  see.  hear,  think,  feel,  move  by  means  of 
the  stimulus.  At  every  second  our  nerve  system 
is  in  a  state  of  new  excitation,  received  from  within 
or  from  without,  and  is  sending  its  shock  to  the 
appropriate  muscles.  These  in  their  turn  contract 
with  an  energy  proportionate  to  the  spur  received. 
At  each  moment  those  telegraph  messengers,  the 
afferent  nerves,  flash  their  messages  to  the  conscious- 
ness behind,  messages  which  in  their  joy  or  pain 
are  at  times  the  most  tremendous  of  stimulants  ; 


OP  MORAL  STIMULANTS  153 

at  each  moment  that  mysterious  force,  the  will,  sets 
its  current  moving  outward,  thrills  the  efferent 
nerves  with  its  power  and  purpose,  and  bids  them 
with  then*  flash  of  energy  stir  the  obedient  muscles 
into  play.  We  have  only  to  think  of  this  machinery 
to  realise  how  infinitesimal  really — for  all  its  seem- 
ing formidable  proportions — is  the  abuse  of  the 
stimulant  in  the  physical  organism,  as  compared 
with  its  wholesome  and  necessary  use. 

Carrying  all  this  in  our  minds,  we  can  now,  with 
less  likelihood  of  going  astray,  discuss  the  action 
of  the  stimulant  in  the  moral  and  religious  sphere. 
Nothing  is  more  interesting  or  instructive  than  to 
watch,  over  the  vast  area  of  human  living  which 
history  opens  to  us,  the  methods  employed  in  this 
business  and  their  results.  It  has  always  been 
realised  that  if  man  needed  a  spur  anywhere  it 
was  in  the  region  of  character,  of  the  higher  part 
of  him.  His^animal  appetites  needed  no  help 
from  the  philosopher  or  moralist.  They  were 
always  ready,  too  ready,  for  their  part.  They 
needed  the  curb  more  than  the  spur.  They  are 
the  oldest  in  him  and  the  most  securely  planted. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  moral  and  spiritual  are  the 
latest  features  of  his  development.  They  are  new 
born  in  him.  The  whole  future  is  theirs,  but  at 
present  they  are  infantile  and  feeble.  And  so  at 
every  point  their  force  has  needed  to  be  nursed  and 
stimulated.  To  guard  this  precious  dower  the 
religions  have  arisen  ;  in  its  interest  philosophers 
have  erected  their  systems.  To  enhance  its  authority 
theology  has  called  in  the  tremendous  conception 
of  rewards  and  punishments  in  a  world  to  come. 


154        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

It  is  true  that  both  in  ancient  and  modern  times 
the  idea  has  possessed  men  of  a  time  coming  when 
character  and  virtue  would  require  no  stimulants 
of  this  kind  ;  when  men  would  do  right  for  right's 
sake  alone.  Thus  Diderot,  in  his  essay  "  Sur  les 
Femmes,"  speaks  of  a  woman  who  promenaded 
in  the  streets  of  Alexandria,  her  feet  bare,  her  hair 
disordered,  a  torch  in  one  hand,  a  ewer  in  the  other, 
and  who  cried,  "  I  would  burn  heaven  with  this 
torch,  and  extinguish  hell  with  this  water,  in  order 
that  man  might  love  God  for  Himself  alone." 
And  Cicero,  in  the  De  Officiis,  nobly  pleads  for  a 
virtue  sufficient  to  itself  without  aid  from  gods 
or  men.  "  We  ought,"  says  he,  "  to  be  convinced 
that  though  we  could  conceal  any  transaction 
from  all  gods  and  men,  yet  that  nothing  avaricious 
should  be  done,  nothing  unjust,  nothing  licentious, 
nothing  incontinent."  We  remember  how  Lessing, 
too,  in  his  "  Education  of  the  Human  Race," 
predicts  the  time  when  men  will  have  no  need 
to  borrow  motives  from  the  future — "  but  will  do 
what  is  right  because  it  is  right." 

As,  upon  a  question  of  this  kind,  we  study  the 
non-Christian  nations,  while  we  find  much  that 
is  repugnant,  it  is  not  this  which  most  strikes  us. 
Far  more  impressive  is  the  spectacle  they  present 
of  an  inspired  movement  of  the  human  spirit.  He 
were  blind  indeed  who  failed  to  see  in  this  the  work- 
ing of  the  Power  that  makes  for  righteousness.  We 
have  here  an  education  of  the  race  in  which  at  every 
point  one  recognises  a  Divine  Preceptor  every- 
where. We  find  a  straining  for  the  highest,  and 
every  known  stimulus  applied  to  the  dormant 


OF  MORAL  STIMULANTS  155 

faculties  of  the  soul.  Under  a  Plato,  a  Seneca,  an 
Epictetus,  philosophy  becomes  a  theology.  Epictetus 
might  be  a  Methodist  preacher.  He  is  ardent  for 
conversions.  Following  his  system,  he  says,  "  from 
a  shameless  man  you  will  become  a  modest  man, 
from  a  disorderly  an  orderly  man,  from  a  faithless 
a  faithful  man,  from  a  man  of  unbridled  habits 
a  sober  man."  Plato  calls  in  the  aid  of  external 
stimulants.  He  realises,  as  the  modern  Church 
realises,  the  power  of  music,  properly  applied,  as  a 
soul's  excitant.  He  would  agree  with  Luther 
that  "  music  is  the  finest  thing  in  the  world  after 
theology."  The  Greek  philosopher,  indeed,  saw 
deeper  into  this  than  the  moderns.  In  the  "  Re- 
public "  he  argues  that  rhythm  and  harmony  enter 
into  the  deepest  parts  of  the  soul,  and  that  by  the 
educated  sense  of  harmony  we  may  discern  between 
the  good  and  the  base,  the  ugly  and  the  beautiful, 
in  all  things. 

And  nowhere  than  among  those  ancient  peoples 
has  there  been  more  vividly  realised,  as  a  stimulus 
of  the  soul,  the  power  of  great  dominant  ideas. 
The  Roman's  patriotism  may  have  had  a  lower 
significance  than  our  own,  but  have  we  any  such 
sense  of  what  we  owe  to  our  country  as  that  which 
made  a  Regulus  go  back  to  Carthage,  to  deliver 
himself  there  to  torture  and  death,  because  he 
deemed  that  course  necessary  to  the  honour  and 
welfare  of  Rome  ?  Who  can  read  his  Plutarch 
without  realising  the  majesty  of  the  ideas  which 
stir  his  heroes,  and  the  strength  of  the  characters 
these  ideas  helped  to  form  !  Plutarch  to-day  even 
is  a  great  school  of  morals.  His  draught  is_an 


156        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

invigorating  one.  We  do  not  wonder  when  we 
read  that  at  the  French  Revolution  it  was  on  him 
a  Carnot,  a  Vergniaud,  a  Madame  Roland  formed 
themselves. 

And  yet  the  ancient  philosophy,  considered  as  a 
universal  moral  stimulant,  was  a  failure.  Aristotle 
himself  confesses  as  much.  Speaking  of  treatises  on 
morals,  he  declares  that  while  they  seem  to  have 
power  to  move  generous  and  liberal  minds,  they 
have  none  to  persuade  the  multitude  to  what  is 
virtuous  and  honourable.  Nor  was  there  much 
moral  stimulus  in  the  classic  religions.  Their 
ceremonies  were  aesthetic  and  spectacular  rather  than 
moral.  In  fact,  as  to  morals,  their  influence,  on 
the  whole,  was  the  other  way.  How  get  moral 
inspiration  from  the  worship  of  gods  that  were 
themselves  grossly  immoral  ? 

It  is  when  we  take  all  this  into  review  that  we 
are  able  the  better  to  estimate  the  new  stimulus 
introduced  into  the  world  by  Christianity.  As 
against  all  that  had  gone  before,  or  was  outside,  we 
have  here  a  religion  that  was,  for  one  thing,  through 
and  through  ethical ;  that  for  another  possessed, 
apart  from  its  precepts,  a  unique  source  of  stimulus  ; 
and  that,  for  a  third  thing,  set  its  inspired  ethic 
working  not  amongst  the  philosophers,  amongst  the 
elite,  but  amongst  the  obscurest  and  most  neglected 
portions  of  humanity.  To  the  virtues  of  the  Greek 
and  Roman  schools  it  brought,  as  Schopenhauer 
himself  acknowledged,  a  new  passion,  the  passion 
of  love,  of  tenderness,  the  passion  for  helping  and 
saving  men.  Personality,  as  the  world  is  now 
beginning  to  recognise,  is  the  foundation  of  every- 


OF  MORAL  STIMULANTS  157 

thing,  and  the  new  Gospel  won  its  fight  in  the  old 
world,  as  it  does  in  the  new,  for  the  reason  that 
its  doctrine  of  love  centred  in  a  Personality  with 
an  absolutely  unique  example  of  love  in  Himself 
and  in  the  power  to  create  it  in  others.  We  have 
spoken  before  of  the  moral  stimulant  of  great  ruling 
ideas.  There  has  been  no  idea  so  potent  in  stimulus 
of  character  as  the  faith  and  trust  that  have  anchored 
themselves  on  Christ.  What  a  testimony  to  this  is 
Renan,  where,  as  an  avowed  outsider,  speaking  of 
the  Port  Royalists,  he  says,  "  Sister  Marie-Claire 
exclaiming  '  Victory  !  Victory  !  '  with  her  last 
breath,  may  have  been  sustained  by  a  faith  no 
longer  our  own,  but  she  proved  that  man  by  his 
will  creates  a  force  the  law  of  which  is  not  the  law 
of  the  flesh.  She  set  forth  the  nature  of  the  spirit 
by  an  argument  superior  to  all  those  of  Descartes  ; 
and  in  showing  us  the  soul  quitting  the  body  as 
a  ripe  fruit  drops  from  its  stalk,  she  taught  us  not 
to  pronounce  too  »lightly  on  the  limits  of  its  destiny." 
With  this  unequalled  stimulant  hi  its  keeping 
the  problem  of  the  modern  Church  is  how  to  apply 
it.  We  are  here  immediately  on  the  question  of 
uses  and  abuses.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  and  dealing 
with  the  broad  masses  of  the  people,  there  is  at 
present  no  great  danger  of  producing  too  much 
moral  intoxication.  The  spiritual  sense  of  the 
British  public  is  not  at  all  overcharged.  It  can 
stand  a  large  amount  of  prodding.  The  man  who 
can  gather  together  the  multitude  from  its  ordinary 
occupations  and  dissipations  and  pour  on  them 
the  stores  of  purifying  emotion  that  are  hid  in  the 
Gospel ;  who  can  in  this  way  create  a  contagion  of 

1 


7 


158        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

love,  an  enthusiasm  for  righteousness,  is  doing 
the  best  possible  service  to  Society  and  the  State. 
The  point  here  is  that  the  exaltation  must  be  a 
normal  and  not  an  abnormal  one.  The  process 
should,  in  fact,  be  like  that  of  kindling  a  fire."  We 
set  light  to  the  paper  and  the  wood  in  order  that, 
when  their  crackle  is  over,  there  may  be  the  stead- 
fast heat  of  the  coal. 

There  should,  in  these  matters,  be  no  emotion 
which  stops  with  emotion.  Few  addresses,  we 
suppose,  have  been  more  immediately  powerful 
than  those  of  Napoleon  to  his  troops.  But  they 
were  always  an  incitement  to  action.  Their  effect 
did  not  rest  in  feeling.  It  showed  in  the  battle 
that  followed.  We  have  no  business  to  stir  men, 
unless  it  is  to  fight  or  to  work.  The  mischief  of 
much  of  our  religionismg  to-day  is  that  its  heady 
draught  is  for  intoxication  rather  than  for  business. 
A  revival  that  simply  burns  up  the  emotional  fuel 
of  a  neighbourhood  ;  that  is  an  %ff air  of  singings 
and  shoutings  rather  than  of  ethical  renewal ; 
that  puts  lyric  exaltation  and  fevered  imaginings  in 
the  place  of  a  changed  character — is  a  species  of 
mental  dram  drinking,  which  people  were  better 
without.  As  Mrs.  Poyser,  in  an  immortal  pro- 
nouncement, has  made  plain  to  us,  the  stimulus 
should  be  that  of  food  rather  than  of  medicine. 

A  final  word.  No  one  can  study  such  a  theme  as 
this,  on  any  broad  scale,  without  realising  the  high 
destiny  of  the  human  spirit.  The  movement  it 
discloses  has  been  so  uniform,  so  universal,  towards 
so  evident  an  end.  The  spiritual  faculty  in  man 
is  here  to-day.  It  is  only  beginning  to  show  its 


OF  MORAL  STIMULANTS  159 

infinite  capacity.  All  things  conspire  for  its 
development.  The  story  of  the  world  is  the 
history  of  its  incessant  stimulation.  And  the 
process  will  go  on  for  ever,  because  as  surely  as 
our  planet  is  stirred  through  spring  and  summer 
through  the  light  and  warmth  the  sun  pours  on  it, 
so  surely  are  we  wrought  on  for  ever  by  a  Sun 
behind  the  sun,  whose  light  and  heat  are  the 
forces  by  which  our  soul  grows,  and  by  which  the 
Eternal  Kingdom  eternally  comes. 


XVI 
A  Question  of  Age 

THE  world  has  of  late  been  discussing  the  question 
of  age  as  related  to  efficiency.  But  there  is  here 
another  question  than  that  of  efficiency.  What  is 
the  relation  of  age  to  character,  to  morality,  to  the 
general  outlook  upon  life  ?  Are  old  men  morally 
higher  than  young  men,  or  the  reverse  ?  Is  public 
or  private  honour  safer  in  the  keeping  of  sixty 
than  of  thirty  ?  Does  religion  count  for  more  at 
one  end  of  life  than  at  the  other  ?  Is  there  such 
a  thing  as  ethical  continuity,  or  are  all  kinds  of 
characters  developed  successively  in  the  progress 
through  the  years  of  a  single  individual  ?  Not  one 
question,  it  appears,  but  dozens  of  questions  start 
to  view  on  this  theme  and  ask  for  the  answers 
which  study  and  experience  can  give. 

At  first  sight  the  answers  are  singularly  confusing. 
The  witnesses  appear  to  contradict  each  other, 
and  by  their  halting  replies  to  bar  the  way  to  a 
verdict.  What  stands  out  most  clearly  in  the 
investigation  is  the  range  of  man's  variability.  It 
is,  perhaps,  the  most  wonderful  thing  about  him. 
We  can  predict  the  character  of  an  oak  through  its 
oakhood.  The  same  may  be  said  of  a  rattlesnake 

160 


A  QUESTION  OF  AGE  161 

or  a  crocodile.  But  no  one  prophesies  in  that  way 
about  a  man.  Where  he  is  to-day,  in  thinking  and 
feeling,  in  politics,  in  religion,  in  character,  offers 
no  certain  clue  as  to  where  to  find  him  two  decades 
further  on.  The  strange  thing  here  is  that  one  half 
the  world  disproves  the  rule  about  the  other  half. 
For  there  are  multitudes  of  men  whose  later  career 
is  an  exact  and  orderly  development  from  the 
earlier.  But  the  induction  we  should  make  from 
studying  these  people  would  be  utterly  upset  by 
the  experience  of  their  next  door  neighbour.  .  There 
are  people  whose  endings  flatly  contradict  their 
beginnings. '--  English  politics  of  to-day  and  yester- 
day offer  us  examples  of  cetat  sixty  disavowing 
and  contemning  every  principle  believed  in  and 
fought  for  by  cetat  thirty.  What  would  Newman 
have  thought,  in  his  evangelical  boyhood,  had  it 
been  whispered  him  that  he  would  die  a  Roman 
Cardinal  ?  Imagine  the  gulf  between  the  Lam  en  - 
nais  who  wrote  the  "  Essai  sur  PIndifference," 
and  the  intransigeant  Lamennais  of  the  "  Paroles  !  " 
Society  presents  us  with  the  spectacle  of  ex-monks 
who  are  preachers  of  atheism,  of  ex-profligates  and 
roues  who  are  active  in  religious  revivals.  Our 
species  is  a  fascinating  study,  but  clearly  not  an 
easy  one. 

When  we  study  the  relation  of  the  years  to  these 
changes  the  first  result  is,  we  have  said,  confusing. 
There  is  a  certain  class  of  facts  which  seem  to  estab- 
lish a  case  against  age  on  the  score  of  feeling  and 
character.  Huxley,  in  one  of  his  letters,  makes 
laughing  allusion  to  senile  morality  as  if  he  sus- 
pected it.  It  has  been  remarked  of  George  Eliot 

11 


162        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

that  in  her  novels  the  characters  deteriorate  as 
they  grow  older.  They  drop  their  idealism.  Dinah 
Morris,  from  inspired  preacher,  settles  down  to  a 
comfortable  housewife.  Lydgate,  the  young  doctor 
in  "  Middlemarch,"  who  begins  with  the  highest 
scientific  aspirations,  is  content  at  the  end  with  a 
fortune  made  out  of  a  gouty  clientele.  And  history, 
on  one  side  at  least,  seems  to  support  this  view. 
It  offers  numbers  of  reputations  ruined  by  the  years. 
Nero  as  a  young  man  seemed  well-disposed  when 
uncfer  Seneca.  Had  Harry  the  Eighth  died  at 
thirty  he  would  have  been  reckoned  one  of  the 
most  popular  of  English  Sovereigns.  In  the  career 
of  Alexander  the  Great  nothing  is  more  noticeable 

w 

than  the  moral  worsening  which  the  years  brought. 
In  place  of  the  early  generosity  and  self-forgetfulness 
came  caprice,  cruelty,  the  murder  of  old  friends 
such  as  Clitus,  Philotas  and  Parmenio.  This  side 
of  the  matter — the  case,  that  is,  for  deterioration 
— has  evidently  impressed  the  modern  mind.  So 
much  so,  indeed,  that  a  recent  medical  writer 
has  advanced  the  view  that  the  moral  sentiments 
suffer  a  natural  decay  in  the  course  of  years,  and 
v  that  age  becomes  ethically  inferior  to  youth  by  a 
process  as  natural  as  the  whitening  of  its  hair  or 
the  lowering  of  its  vital  force. 

This  last  assertion  is,  of  course,  in  sympathy 
with  that  materialistic  determinism  which  has  gained 
such  wide  currency,  and  which  makes  character 
an  affair  purely  of  molecular  movements  in  the 
organism.  But  this  solution  is  far  too  simple  for 
the  facts.  For  in  those  so  far  adduced  we  have 
only  one  side.  What  is  equally  certain  is  that  if 


A  QUESTION  OF  AGE  163 

some  men  have  worsened  with  age,  others  have 
grown  better.  The  world  is  full  of  instances  where 
the  highest  levels  of  idealism,  of  spiritual  character, 
of  heroic  doing  and  suffering  have  been  exhibited 
at  life's  farther  end.  Polycarp,  through  all  his  long 
.life,  was  never  nobler  than  when,  asked  by  his 
judges  to  renounce  his  Master,  he  replied,  "  Eighty 
and  six  years  have  I  been  His  servant.  .  .  .  How 
can  I  now  blaspheme  my  King  and  my  Saviour  ?  " 
Epictetus  is  at  his  best  when,  as  an  old  man,  he 
finds  his  one  occupation  is  "  to  praise  God."  It 
is  not  the  young  but  the  old  Augustine  that  we 
revere.  There  was  no  moral  falling  off  in  aged 
WycKffe,  nor  in  Sir  Thomas  More,  as  he  with  a 
laughing  serenity  laid  his  head  on  the  block  for 
his  faith.  No,  nor  in  Baxter,  who  according  to 
Calamy  "  talked  about  another  world  like  one 
that  had  been  there ; "  nor  in  Zinzendorf,  nor 
Swedenborg,  nor  in  John  Wesley.  These  facts 
are  as  plain  as  the  others,  and  have  to  be  fitted 
somewhere  into  our  result.  Whatever  else  they 
do  they  disprove  the  mere  mechanical  theory, 
Man  is  not  to  be  reckoned  up  simply  in  terms  of  hia 
brain  tissue  or  blood  corpuscles. 

From  what  sources,  then,  are  we  finally  to  derive 
our  judgment  ?  What  does  the  age  factor  amount 
to  in  the  question  of  character  ?  Here,  to  begin 
with,  we  have  to  concede  something,  though,  as', 
we  have  just  said,  by  no  means  everything,  to  the 
nature  processes.  Our  own  consciousness,  our 
own  volition  are,  we  soon  discover,  not  the  only 
makers  of  ourselves.  The  child  mind  becomes 
the  youth  mind,  and  the  youth  mind  the  man 


164        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

mind,  without  any  leave  asked  of  us.  As  life 
proceeds  we  are  astonished  to  find  how  we 
have  grown  into  things  and  out  of  them.  Our 
loves,  our  fascinations,  our  obsessions,  take  leave 
of  us,  and  we  cannot  explain  why.  It  is  as  if  our 
nature  has  fed  on  one  kind  of  food  to  repletion, 
and  then  had  suddenly  lost  appetite.  The  long 
persistence  in  one  kind  of  life  brings,  in  some  natures, 
a  reaction,  in  which  desire  calls  out  for  all  that 
other  side  which  it  has  missed.  Under  this  influence 
the  debauchee  becomes  at  times  an  ascetic.  In 
other  instances  it  is  the  contrary  that  happens. 
The  ascetic  discovers  stirring  in  him  the  inclination 

To  seize  on  life's  dull  joys  from  a  strange  fear 
Lest  losing  them,  all's  lost  and  nought  remains. 

There  was  a  certain  truth  to  nature  in  Renan's 
painful  drama,  "  The  Abbesse  de  Jouarre,"  where 
he  depicts  the  devotee,  as  after  a  life-long  career 
of  devotion,  falling  suddenly  into  sensuality.  It 
is  indeed  the  greatest  mistake  to  imagine  that  the 
animal  inclinations  lose  their  hold  with  the  advance 
of  years.  Thackeray's  Lord  Steyne  was  no  fledgling, 
and  he  was  true  to  type.  The  debaucheries  of  a 
Tiberius  were  greatest  at  the  end.  The  tendency 
here  has  shown  itself  not  only  in  mere  profligates, 
but  in  men  otherwise  of  highest  character  and  per- 
formance. How  otherwise  are  we  to  explain  the 
fact  that  John  Knox,  and  Farel,  the  Swiss  reformer, 
the  one  at  sixty  and  the  other  at  sixty-nine,  each 
married  a  young  girl — to  the  astonishment  and 
grief  of  their  friends  ! 

And    these    mysterious    processes — actions    and 


A  QUESTION  OP  AGE  165 

reactions  of  the  inner  nature — are,  in  their  effect 
upon  character,  supplemented  by  circumstances 
which  are  special  to  age.  Both  by  what  they  gain 
and  by  what  they  lose,vmen  in  later  life  find  them- 
selves far  more  dangerously  placed  than  in  earlier 
years.  They  are,  for  one  thing,  freer  from  restraint > 
They  are  no  longer  subordinates,  but  lords  of  them- 
selves. Their  old  guides  and  teachers  have  disap- 
peared. In  many  instances,  and  notoriously  to-day, 
beliefs  which  once  exercised  a  restraining  influence 
have  lost  their  power.  Idols  have  been  shattered. 
Ideals  which  shone  once  as  with  light  from  heaven 
are  gone.  The  "  vjsionjsplendid  "  has  faded  "  into 
the  light  of  common  day."  They  have  been  behind 
the  scenes  to  discover  that  effects  which  imposed 
on  their  youth  as  something  angelic  and  celestial 
are  an  affair  of  stage  carpentry  and  the  big  brush. 
Age  is  thus  with  multitudes  the  time  of  disillusion- 
ment, in  itself  the  most  perilous  of  mental  states. 
It  is  at  this  later  period,  too,  that  men,  if  ever, 
become  rich.  And  the  rich  man  has  always  found 
it  hard  to  enter  the  Kingdom.  No  age  is  fonder  of 
its  money  than  ours,  or  more  prolific  of  arguments 
for  its  possession.  It  nevertheless  remains  that 
between  property  and  the  highest  idealism  no 
nexus  has  yet  been  found.  It  is  moneyless  youth 
that  dreams  the  great  dreams,  that  attempts  the 
heroic.  We  never  hear  of  an  elderly  millionaire 
going  as  a  missionary.  It  is  money,  too,  that  buys 
all  the  animal  pleasures,  all  the  magnificences, 
all  that  holds  men  by  their  senses  and  that  dulls 
the  eye  of  the  soul.  What  is  more,  the  possession 
of  wealth  not  only  buys  gratifications  of  this  kind, 


166         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

but  it  can  purchase  condonation  of  the  most  illicit 
of  them.  A  man,  if  he  is  rich  enough,  can  buy 
up  the  whole  Ten  Commandments.  There  is  a 
growing  number  of  this  class  who  act  on  the  prin- 
ciple expressed  by  the  famous  Duchesse  du  Maine  : 
"  Ce  que  chez  les  mortels  est  une  effronterie,  entre 
nous  autres  demi-dieux  n'est  qu'honnete  galanterie." 
And  apart  from  this  use  of  its  possessions  there 
comes  with  man  in  mature  years  that  mere  love 
of  hoarding  than  which  nothing  more  abases  the 
soul.  The  moralists  of  all  ages  have  protested 
against  it,  but,  as  it  seems,  in  vain.  How  convincing 
is  the  satire  here  of  Cicero  :  "  What  avarice  in  an 
old  man  can  propose  to  itself  I  cannot  conceive  ; 
for  can  anything  be  more  absurd  than,  in  proportion 
as  less  of  our  journey  remains,  to  seek  a  greater 
supply  of  provisions  ?  "  Were  the  Roman  orator 
here  to-day  he  would  find  more  reason  than  ever  for 
his  rebuke. 

Avarice,  power,  unrestrained  freedom,  disillusion- 
ment, the  increase  of  material  satisfactions,  these 
are  some  of  the  handicaps  which  maturity  puts  upon 
the  pursuit  of  the  spiritual  life.  No  wonder  that, 
in  the  soul's  pilgrimage,  this  patch  of  ground  should 
at  times  have  fallen  into  such  bad  repute.  We  see 
the  reason  for  it.  Men  fall  so  often  here  because 
they  neglect  to  regard  this  period  as,  not  less  than 
the  earlier  ones,  a  time  of  probation.  The  mistake 
is  to  suppose  that  in  its  later  stage  the  battle  of 
life  is  over,  whereas,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  it  has 
reached  its  hottest  phase.  We  give  all  manner  of 
instructions,  guidances,  safeguardings  for  youth 
and  young'manhood,  as  though  these  were  the  only 


A  QUESTION  OP  AGE  167 

breakneck  parts  of  the  climb.  A  man  may  go 
through  them  all  to  find  himself  bogged  at  the  last. 
The  Slough  of  Despond  is  for  many  at  the  end  rather 
than  the  beginning. 

But  is  there  any  necessity  that  men  should  fall 
here  ?  The  examples  we  have  cited,  units  from  an 
innumerable  host,  are  testimonies  to  the  contrary. 
There  is,  indeed,  nothing  either  in  the  circumstances 
or  the  inner  evolution  of  age  that  furnishes  a  real 
excuse  for  failure.  At  best  the  excuses  are  cowards' 
reasons  for  running  away.  Are  men  disillusioned  ? 
What  with  ?  Persons,  circumstances,  beliefs  ? 
What  then  ?  Am  I  to  turn  false  because  someone 
else  or  something  else  has  proved  so  ?  If  we 
have  discovered  some  frauds  and  hollownesses 
in  the  world,  has  not  our  journey  discovered  to 
us  also  some  grand  and  solid  realities  ?  If 
external  authorities  have  lost  their  hold,  has 
not  their  place  been  taken  by  a  nobler  inward 
compulsion  ?  Have  we  not  discovered  that  "  the 
soul  is  free,  not  when  it  is  at  the  mercy  of 
every  random  impulse,  but  when  it  is  acted  upon 
by  congenial  forces,  when  it  is  exposed  to  spiritual 
pressure,  to  constraint  within  itself  !  "  The  achieve- 
ment of  a  serene  old  age  ;  of  preserving,  amid  its 
manifold  and  peculiar  temptations,  a  mind  un- 
stained, unspotted,  is  indeed  faith's  mightiest 
work.  It  is  its  final,  crowning  victory  over  this 
present  world. 


XVII 
"  Under  Direction  " 

"  ONE  only  thing  has  been  a  terrible  pang  to  me, 
the  giving  over  of  my  own  judgment  in  questions 
of  moral  judgment  to  any  human  authority.  It 
is  so  absolutely  new  and  incomprehensible  an  idea 
to  me,  that  any  other  test  should  supplant,  without 
risk  to  itself  and  me,  the  inner  test  of  my  actions 
that  my  conscience  affords."  Thus  wrote  Alice  Le 
Strange,  one  of  the  most  gifted  and  delightful  of 
women,  the  future  wife  of  the  brilh'ant  mystic, 
Laurence  Oliphant,  to  Thomas  Lake  Harris,  the 
mysterious  American  preacher  and  hypnotist  to 
whom  the  Englishman  had  already  sold  his  soul.  The 
lady,  the  descendant  of  one  of  the  oldest  famih'es  in 
England,  had  already  been  persuaded  by  her 
betrothed  to  accept  the  American  as  absolute  director 
of  her  mind  and  conscience,  though  she  declares  in  this 
same  letter  that  "  she  felt  she  was  throwing  her 
own  conscience  overboard  and  putting  out  the  one 
clear  light  God  had  given  her."  What  came  of 
this  "  direction,"  both  for  herself  and  her  future 
husband,  the  world  has  read  in  Mrs.  Oliphant's 
biography.  The  quotation,  and  the  incident  alto- 
gether, may  serve  as  introduction  to  the  discussion 

168 


"  UNDER  DIRECTION  "  169 

of  a  question  full  of  vital  issues,  and  about  which 
the  present  generation  is  in  grievous  want  of  some 
clear  leading. 

The  action  of  the  Oliphants  in  placing  themselves, 
body  and  conscience,  under  the  absolute  will  of 
another,  would  probably  strike  most  of  us  in  the 
way  it  struck  the  lady  herself  when  it  was  first 
proposed  to  her.  It  would  be  throwing  the  con- 
science overboard,  the  putting  out  of  our  guiding 
light,  an  act  in  defiance  both  of  our  religion  and  our 
common  sense.  Yet,  let  us  remember,  their  act  was 
only  the  carrying  to  a  certain  length  of  a  tendency, 
a  principle,  we  may  say,  that  is  embedded  deep  in 
human  nature.  We  are  all  of  us,  more  or  less, 
"  under  direction."  "  Direction,"  in  one  form  or 
another,  is  taken  for  granted  in  the  very  constitution 
of  society.  Some  of  our  greatest  organisations  are 
founded  entirely  on  this  idea.  The  relation  of 
children  to  their  elders  is  one  of  "  direction."  The 
whole  theory  and  practice  of  education  suppose  the 
constant  subordination  of  the  pupil  to  his  teacher. 
We  pour  our  facts,  our  doctrines,  our  views  into 
these  young  minds  and  expect  them  to  be  received 
without  contradiction.  To  refuse  acceptance  is 
a  disobedience,  demanding  reproof  or  punishment. 

The  grown-up  man  is,  over  a  large  surface  of  his 
life,  in  the  same  condition  as  the  child.  The  soldier, 
the  sailor,  has  given  over  his  mind  to  that  of  his 
superior.  The  world  will  have  autocracy  as  long 
as  a  ship  sails  the  seas.  We  cannot  navigate  by 
popular  suffrage .  The  safety  of  the  vessel  and  the 
making  of  the  voyage  depend  on  the  understanding 
that  the  hundreds  beneath  him  execute  the  will 


170        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

of  the  man  at  the  top.  On  a  larger  scale  we  have  the 
State,  by  its  laws  and  statutes  limiting  and  directing 
the  conduct  of  the  citizens.  On  a  wider  scale  still 
we  see  superior  races  governing  the  destinies, 
developing  the  whole  mind  and  interior  life  of  the 
inferior  and  feebler  peoples. 

The  principle,  we  see  then,  is  everywhere  at 
work.  The  point  of  dispute  is  as  to  how  far  the 
principle  shall  be  carried.  The  dispute  has  been 
one  of  the  fiercest  in  history.  It  is  on  this  question 
that  religion  has  fought  some  of  its  greatest  battles, 
and  has  undergone  its  sharpest  divisions.  In  the 
Roman  Church  the  "  confessor  "  and  the  "  director  " 
are  all  powerful.  The  devout  Catholic  on  the  most 
vital  questions  of  his  interior  life  takes  the  mind 
and  will  of  the  priest  as  a  substitute  for  his  own. 
In  the  religious  orders  the  submission  is  still  more 
absolute.  The  first  duty  which  Ignatius  Loyola 
enjoined  on  his  followers  was  that  of  obedience. 
He  tells  them  what  he  means  by  obedience.  As  a 
corpse  has  no  motion  of  its  own,  but  is  moved 
solely  from  the  outside  ;  as  the  violin  is  passive 
in  the  hands  of  the  musician,  so  must  it  be  with 
the  Jesuit  and  his  superior. 

The  Roman  Church  has,  however,  by  no  means 
a  monopoly  of  religious  "  direction."  Anglicanism, 
as  we  know,  in  its  later  Ritualistic  phases,  has 
developed  a  kind  of  Confessionalism  in  which  we 
have  the  dangers  of  the  Roman  system  without 
the  Roman  safeguards.  But  let  us  be  candid  here. 
There  is  a  Protestant  "  direction  "  as  well  as  a 
sacerdotal.  The  principle  under  a  different  form 
is  in  as  vigorous  operation  on  the  one  side  as  on 


"  UNDER  DIRECTION  "  171 

the  other.  The  Reformation,  as  we  trace  its  history 
throughout  Europe,  was  the  affair  of  about  half 
a  dozen  dominant  wills.  The  leaders  had  no 
qualms  about  impressing  themselves  with  their 
authority's  utmost  weight  on  the  minds  of  their 
followers.  Calvin's  Geneva  Constitution,  Knox's 
"  Book  of  Discipline "  were  drawn  up  with  the 
intention  of  ruling  men's  actions  and  consciences. 
The  peace  of  Augsburg  made  a  man's  religion  an  affair 
of  the  state  he  belonged  to.  In  modern  times  the 
Free  Churches,  though  organised  on  a  democratic 
basis,  have  given  full  play  to  the  principle  of  "  direc- 
tion." A  Wesley,  a  Spurgeon  did  the  theological 
thinking  for  their  followers.  The  popular  preacher 
of  to-day  expects  that  his  congregation  will  take 
its  doctrinal  colour  from  his  expositions. 

One  could  enlarge  on  this  statement  of  existing 
conditions,  but  it  is  time  we  went  in  search  of 
the  principle  which  should  guide  us  in  our  judgment 
of  them.  Direction  clearly,  of  a  certain  kind, 
and  up  to  a  certain  point,  is  a  good  thing.  If  it 
were  not  there  would  be  no  such  general  acceptance 
of  it.  It  is  easy,  indeed,  to  see  where  the  good  of  it 
lies.  Human  education  all  through  is  an  affair  of 
the  greater  minds  leading  and  inspiring  the  smaller 
ones.  Redemption  has  ever  been  through  the 
higher  soul  possessing  the  lower  souls,  pouring  its 
energy  into  them,  lifting  them  towards  its  own 
standard.  The  principle  has  been  at  work  in  every 
age.  In  the  Symposium  of  Plato,  Alcibiades, 
speaking  of  the  influence  of  Socrates  upon  him, 
opens  to  us  the  secret.  After  a  jest  at  the  ugly 
head  of  Socrates,  which  he  likens  to  the  mask  of  a 


172        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Silenus,  he  continues  :  "  But  when  I  opened  him 
and  looked  within  at  his  serious  purpose,  I  saw  in  him 
divine  and  golden  images  of  such  fascinating  beauty 
that  I  was  ready  to  do  in  a  moment  whatever 
Socrates  commanded."  Here  we  see  the  legitimate 
ascendancy,  the  true  "  direction."  The  soul  bows 
to  the  greater  spirit  because  it  recognises  the  inner 
beauty  there  exhibited.  It  realises  at  once  that 
the  road  it  points  out  is  the  true  way  to  the  heights. 

But  how  far  shall  "  direction  "  go  ?  That,  we 
have  observed,  is  the  crucial  point.  Can  we,  amid 
the  prevailing  confusion,  find  our  way  to  any 
sure  dividing  line  ?  We  spoke  at  the  beginning  of 
the  training  of  the  children.  Let  us  come  back  to 
that.  At  the  opening  of  its  career  a  child  is  carried 
in  arms.  Its  entire  movement  is  in  the  hands  of 
nurse  or  mother.  Later  it  is  taught  to  walk,  the  little 
feet  upheld  by  the  guiding  hand.  But  the  "  direc- 
tion "  is  progressively  relaxed,  until  at  last  our 
youngster  runs  alone.  The  training  here  we  see 
has  been  one  of  restriction  and  guidance,  but 
always  with  a  view  to  an  ultimate  independence. 
The  end  aimed  at  is  that  the  child  may  walk  alone. 

This  is  the  training  of  the  body,  and  it  is  im- 
possible not  to  see  its  analogy  to  the  training  of 
the  soul.  Education,  politics,  religion  are  all  phases 
of  human  development,  and  the  enlarged  vision  sees 
them  all  as  working  towards  one  end,  the  perfection 
of  the  individual.  Where  authority  is  exercised 
over  others  the  object,  in  any  proper  conception, 
is  that  these  others  may  in  their  turn  gain  authority 
— over  themselves.  Their  present  guidance  is  to 
help  them  by-and-by  to  walk  alone.  When  govern- 


"UNDER  DIRECTION"  173 

ment,  when  religion  pursue  any  other  aim  than 
this,  they  have  become  not  the  friends,  but 
the  enemies  of  man.  The  worst  disservice  we 
can  render  to  another  is  to  try  and  create 
him  after  our  image.  Who  are  you  who 
seek  to  turn  this  brother  man  from  his  own 
proper  destiny  ?  Who  are  you  who  seek  to  stifle 
this  soul's  voice  and  to  make  it  a  mere  echo  of  your 
own  ?  We  have  heard  people  speak  sometimes,  in 
their  dealing  with  the  young,  of  "  breaking  their 
will."  But  what  of  their  own  will  ?  Shall  someone 
break  that  ? 

Where  "  direction  "  has  gone  so  fatally  wrong, 
in  governments  and  so  many  forms  of  religion, 
is  in  the  failure  to  recognise  that  their  proper  end 
is  not  to  suppress  individuality,  to  suppress  the 
will,  but  to  develop  it  to  its  utmost  and  highest. 
The  priest,  the  teacher  has  made  hideous  wreck 
and  failure  of  his  work  when  it  leads  the  disciple 
to  lean  ever  more  heavily  upon  him  instead  of  to 
walk  in  his  own  freedom.  To  "  break  the  will  " 
forsooth  !  One  might  as  well  talk  of  mending  a 
watch  by  breaking  its  mainspring.  The  human 
will  is  of  all  things  in  this  earth  the  most  wonderful, 
the  most  sacred.  To  add  to  its  resources,  to  secure 
its  freedom  of  action,  to  open  up  to  it  the  way  of 
inner  reinforcement,  should  be  the  one  supreme 
object  of  spiritual  education.  For  it  is  here,  in  this 
secret  place,  man  touches  his  godhood.  It  is  here, 
in  the  soul's  innermost,  holiest  ground,  when  with 
this  single  invisible  force  he  meets  the  onset  of 
passion,  the  craven  voice  of  his  fears,  the  solicita- 
tions of  the  world,  the  threats  of  foes,  with  his 


174        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

invincible  "  I  will,"  that  man  shows  his  kinship 
with  the  God  who  made  him. 

But  the  way  to  this  freedom  is  a  slow  one,  and 
there  are  no  safe  short  cuts.  That  is  religion's 
excuse,  and  a  good  one,  for  keeping  its  children  in 
tutelage  so  long.  Goethe,  enamoured  as  he  was  of 
inner  liberty,  saw  this  clearly.  "  Everything," 
says  he,  "  that  frees  our  spirit  without  giving  us 
the  mastery  over  ourselves  is  pernicious."  Indeed, 
we  come  only  to  our  freedom  by  yielding  ourselves 
to  another  compulsion.  As  a  modern  writer  puts  it : 
"  The  soul  is  free,  not  when  it  is  at  the  mercy  of 
every  random  impulse,  but  when  it  is  acted  upon 
by  congenial  forces,  when  it  is  exposed  to  spiritual 
pressure,  to  constraint  within  itself."  The  will 
feels  itself  most  divinely  free  when  it  mysteriously 
realises  its  unity  with  the  universal  Will  out  of  which 
itself  has  come.  In  Quaker  Barclay's  phrase  it  is 
at  its  true  level  when  it  finds  itself  "  led  inwardly 
and  immediately  by  the  Spirit  of  God." 

It  is  by  this  reinforcement  and  spiritual  direction 
of  the  individual  will  that  man  will  eventually 
fight  down  all  his  foes  and  come  into  his  kingdom. 
To  weaken  it,  whether  by  passion  or  by  despotism, 
is  to  slay  the  soul.  Poor  Oscar  Wilde  in  his  "  De 
Profundis,"  that  confession  of  a  broken  heart, 
writ  in  blood  and  tears,  tells  us  how  the  flesh  can 
slay.  "  Desire  at  the  end  was  a  malady  or  a  mad- 
ness or  both.  ...  I  ceased  to  be  lord  over  myself. 
I  was  no  longer  the  captain  of  my  soul  and  did  not 
know  it.  I  allowed  pleasure  to  dominate  me.  I  ended 
in  horrible  disgrace."  On  the  other  hand,  when 
prieste  and  religious  teachers  assail  the  will  with 


"UNDER  DIRECTION"  175 

spiritual  threat  or  brow-beating  they  are  enemies 
only  less  to  be  dreaded  than  the  passions.  It  was 
the  emasculation  a  misplaced  zeal  has  produced  that 
led  Gibbon  to  declare  that  "  it  was  the  virtues 
rather  than  the  vices  of  the  clergy  that  were  danger- 
ous to  society,"  a  remark  that  Hume  has  endorsed. 
Not  coercion,  but  inspiration ;  not  the  forging  of 
fetters  for  the  soul,  but  the  surrounding  it  with 
heaven's  own  freest  air  is  the  function  of  the 
teacher,  the  true  mission  of  the  Church. 

The  freedom  thus  won  can  never  be  misused, 
or  turned  to  licence.  For  the  souls  that  reach  it 
find  themselves  everywhere  overarched  by  the  same 
spiritual  laws  and  controlled  by  the  same  beneficent 
forces.  Nature  is  in  no  hurry  in  granting  this 
freedom.  She  knows  the  danger  of  hurry.  Until 
tutelage  has  become  a  hindrance  rather  than  a 
help  she  will  keep  men  in  tutelage.  But  the 
government,  the  Church,  the  teacher  that  are  wise 
in  their  generation  will  work  always  by  her  secret 
instructions.  They  will  govern,  guide  and  teach 
in  order  that  man  may  at  the  end  govern,  guide 
and  teach  himself. 


XVIII 
The   Ethics   of   Victory 

"  STRIFE  is  the  Father  of  all  things,  the  King 
of  all ;  it  makes  of  some  Gods,  of  others  men  :  of 
some  it  makes  slaves,  of  others  free  men."  Thus 
Heraclitus  of  Ephesus.  In  periods  of  great 
national  excitement — in  America  a  Presidential 
election,  in  England  or  France  a  national  vote  at 
the  polls — we  have  what  appears  almost  a  con- 
firmation of  the  old  sage's  contention.  We  witness 
a  tremendous  conflict ;  in  our  ears  rings  the  shout  of 
the  victors,  the  moan  of  the  vanquished  ;  we  watch 
an  astonishing  displacement  of  power  ;  the  ascent 
of  unknown  men  to  prominence,  the  descent  of 
known  ones  to  obscurity.  Every  citizen  feels  him- 
self either  conqueror  or  conquered.  His  private 
and  individual  affairs  are  swallowed  up  in  the 
common  consciousness.  That  his  side,  his  party 
is  up  or  down  makes  his  happiness  or  his  chagrin. 
In  this  immense  tumult  of  feeling  one  feature  of 
the  situation,  even  in  the  sanest  minds,  is  apt  to  be 
obscured.  The  intoxication  of  victory  may  make 
us  forget  that  there  is  an  ethic  of  victory,  and  that 
this  is  really  in  the  long  run  the  only  thing  worth 
considering.  It  may  be  worth  while  to  examine 
this  aspect  of  the  matter. 

176 


THE  ETHICS  OF  VICTORY  177 

Man  has  been  diligently  fighting  his  neighbour 
from  the  beginning ;  but  it  was  comparatively 
late  in  history  that  our  question  about  the  business 
dawned  upon  him  as  even  a  subject  for  discussion. 
In  the  dim  unwritten  past  he  fought  as  those 

Dragons  of  the  prime 

That  tare  each  other  in  their  slime. 

The  morality  here,  if  such  we  may  call  it,  was  worse 
even  than  that  of  the  beasts  of  prey.  The  brutes 
conquered  to  satisfy  their  hunger,  but  with  man 
an  essential  part  of  the  joy  of  victory  was  the 
discomfiture  and  agony  of  his  vanquished  foe. 
In  imperial  Rome,  at  the  height  of  its  civilisation, 
a  conqueror's  "triumph  "  offered  as  its  chief  and  most 
enjoyed  feature  the  spectacle  of  distinguished  cap- 
tives dragged,  manacled,  behind  his  car.  What 
"  ethic  of  victory  "  was  in  the  mind  of  an  Attila, 
of  a  Genghis  Khan  ;  of  the  Ottoman  Bajazet,  who 
at  the  battle  of  Nicopolis,  where  the  flower  of  the 
Western  chivalry  were  slain,  had  the  thousands  of 
prisoners  beheaded  before  him,  the  frightful  work 
going  on  through  all  the  long  hours  of  a  summer 
day  ;  or  of  Timour  the  Tartar,  Bajazet's  conqueror, 
who  as  he  swept  through  Asia  made  of  city  after 
city  a  smoking  ruin,  where  neither  man  nor  beast 
survived,  and  where  all  that  was  left  was  a  pyramid 
of  skulls  ? 

And  that  kind  of  victory  is  not  yet  obsolete  in  the 
world.  There  are  races,  counting  millions  of  men, 
ready,  if  the  chance  offers,  to  repeat  it  to-day. 
What  we  call  civilised  warfare  reproduces  three- 
parts  of  it.  And  in  our  own  civic  and  political 

12 


178         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

contests,  waged  with  tongue  and  pen,  on  the 
platform  and  at  the  polling  booths,  have  we  not 
all  felt  the  ancient  savagery  stir  in  our  blood,  and 
leap  ever  and  anon  to  expression  in  thought  and 
speech  ?  The  barbaric  inheritance  in  us  is  so 
old,  so  firmly  established ;  and  the  new  in  us, 
the  high  and  spiritual,  is  so  new  and  inexperienced, 
that  the  battle  is  continually  flinging  us  back 
again  on  that  prehistoric  instinct  which  links  us 
with  the  Druid  and  the  stone  age  man  that  went 
before  us.  We  find  in  us  for  the  moment  his  lack 
of  imagination  ;  his  failure  to  appreciate  the  stand- 
point of  the  other  man  ;  even  something  of  his  base 
delight  over  the  humiliation  our  opponent  is  suffer- 
ing. There  is  evidently — and  we  realise  it  when  we 
have  regained  our  heads — no  moral  discipline  more 
needed,  no  moral  danger  more  imminent  and  for- 
midable than  that  of  the  moment  of  victory. 

The  first  danger  here  is  that  of  mistaking  an 
outside  triumph  for  an  inward  and  real  one.  A 
very  considerable  proportion  of  what  are  hailed  as 
victories  are,  to  the  seeing  eye,  bad  defeats.  That 
is  true  both  of  persons  and  causes.  In  the  struggle 
with  our  rival  he  may  have  gone  down.  But  who 
has  conquered  ?  If  we  have  been  unjust  to  him,  and 
fought  him  with  unhallowed  weapons,  we  may  be 
called  the  victors,  but  our  place  is  lower  than  his. 
The  best  men  found  that  out  long  ago.  Plato  never 
ceases  to  reiterate  how  infinitely  better  it  is  to 
suffer  injustice  than  to  do  it.  "  The  unjust  doer  of 
unjust  actions,"  says  he  in  the  "  Gorgias,"  "  is 
miserable  in  any  case — more  miserable,  however,  if 
he  be  not  punished."  If  through  and  after  our 


THE  ETHICS  OF  VICTORY  179 

battle,  pride,  vainglory  and  the  instinct  of  revenge 
have  swept  over  us  and  had  their  way  in  us,  what- 
ever shouts  and  jubilations  are  rising  outside,  we 
are  the  defeated  party. 

A  similar  thing  has  to  be  said  of  causes.  The 
worst  day  for  a  spiritual  movement  often  enough 
has  been  that  of  its  outward  success.  Constantino's 
imperialising  of  Christianity  was  the  defeat  of  its 
inner  idea.  The  elevation  of  its  teachers  to  temporal 
power  was  their  degradation  as  prophets  of  the  Un- 
seen. When  the  Church  had  won  to  the  top, 
and  was  lording  it  over  princes  and  emperors,  it 
forgot  the  thing  it  had  come  for.  And  do  not 
let  us  imagine  that  the  dangers  of  victory  are  con- 
fined to  any  one  department  of  the  spiritual  move- 
ment. They  show  everywhere.  The  German  Ana- 
baptists of  the  Reformation  time  were  many  of 
them  excellent  men,  examples  of  learning,  piety  and 
blameless  life.  But  when,  as  at  Miinster  and  else- 
where, in  the  troubles  of  the  time,  the  party  gained 
a  momentary  political  mastery,  we  have  the  story 
of  monstrous  excesses,  of  ruthless  slaughterings  of 
unoffending  people,  of  wildest  debauchery.  It  is 
the  saddest  of  histories,  indeed,  this  of  a  temporal 
victory  acting  on  undisciplined  natures  to  blight 
their  early  promise,  and  wreck  the  moral  beginnings 
within  them.  We  remember  Plato's  description 
of  the  tyrant.  He  begins  always,  says  he,  as  a  pro- 
tector. 

It  is  significant  also  to  note  how  different  are 
the  results  of  the  most  resounding  victories  from  the 
expectations  of  the  combatants.  A  public  triumph 
sets  forces  in  motion — new,  incalculable — which 


180         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

neither  side  had  wotted  of.  Most  victors  in  these 
scenes  suffer  soon  after  from  cruel  disillusionments. 
Human  nature,  one  may  think,  has  to  pay  a  price  to 
the  infernal  powers  for  all  its  achievements.  The 
European  Reformation  was  a  great  deliverance,  but 
over  its  whole  area,  over  England,  Scotland,  Ger- 
many, Switzerland,  the  after  conduct  of  princes 
and  nobles  on  the  one  side,  and  of  the  peasantry  on 
the  other,  filled  its  leaders,  filled  Knox  and  Luther, 
Calvin  and  Melancthon,  with  despair.  The  French 
Revolution  at  its  beginning  excited  the  noblest 
spirits  to  rapture.  The  planting  of  the  tree  of 
liberty  on  the  Champ  de  Mars  seemed  the  dawn 
of  a  millennium.  Wordsworth  sang  of  it : — 

Bliss  were  it  in  that  dawn  to  be  alive, 
And  to  be  young  were  very  heaven. 

What  followed  drove  the  poets  into  pessimism, 
and  the  world-rulers  to  the  extremities  of  reaction. 
The  English  democracy  went  mad  with  delight 
over  the  Reform  Bill  of  1832.  Two  years  after — 
only  two  short  years — Earl  Grey  had  resigned, 
beaten  over  Irish  coercion  !  In  all  these  instances, 
and  many  more  could  be  cited,  a  great  and  lasting 
thing  had  been  done,  a  long  stride  forward  had 
been  taken.  But  all  the  problems  had  not  been 
solved,  nor  had  Paradise  been  regained.  Men 
found  themselves  instead  in  the  region  of  new  dis- 
ciplines and  new  fatigues. 

From  this  long  experience  of  the  past  it  is  time 
we  had  all  of  us  reached  a  juster  estimate  of  what 
victory  means  and  entails.  It  is  time,  especially, 
that  we  realised  the  stern  ethic  it  imposes  on  us. 


THE  ETHICS  OF  VICTORY  181 

That  ethic  leaves  amplest  room  for  joy.  It  is, 
after  all,  a  great  thing  to  win,  and  Nature  meant  us 
to  believe  it  is  great.  Else  why  our  apparatus  of 
enthusiasm  ?  But  we  need  to  be  sure  of  what 
we  are  winning.  There  is  to  be  no  mean  Schaden- 
freude, no  ignoble  delight  that  our  opponent  is 
humiliated.  Our  victory  is  unworthy  unless  we 
believe  it  to  be  as  good  for  him  as  for  ourselves. 
If  it  be  not  a  gain  to  humanity  at  large,  in  which 
he  is  included,  it  is  no  end  that  we  should  fight  for. 
If  the  triumph  be  over  a  gross  injustice,  from  which 
we  have  suffered,  and  in  the  perpetration  of  which 
our  opponent  has  taken  part,  the  victory  for  him 
and  us  will  be  simply  in  the  reinstatement  of 
justice.  Here  "  not  to  do  likewise  is  the  best  re- 
venge." Our  quarrel  is  with  narrowing  ideas-, 
with  hateful  survivals,  with  worn-out  institutions  ; 
never  with  the  persons  who  represent  them.  We 
fight  that  they,  with  us,  may  come  into  a  larger  in- 
heritance. 

It  is  as  we  become  possessed  with  this  higher 
ethic  that  our  fighting  enthusiasms  are  more  and 
more  turned  from  the  old  arena  to  a  new  one. 
To-day  man's  greatest  fight  is  with  one  whom  he 
loves  while  he  wrestles  with  her  :  his  conquests 
are  not  over  his  fellow,  but  over  Nature.  Here  the 
joy  of  victory  is  without  alloy  ;  its  rapture  means 
no  "opponent's  humiliation  ;  the  enemy  is  a  friend, 
a  mother  who  laughs  as  her  child  wrests  from  her 
the  latest  secret.  In  view  of  all  this  one  may  say 
the  true  human  advance  lies  aside  from  politics. 
The  kings  of  music,  of  art,  of  science,  nf  literature  ; 
the  great  souls  that  give  us  a  Hamlet,  a  Moonlight 


182        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Sonata,  a  Madonna  Ansidei ;  that  discover  the  secret 
of  steam,  of  electricity  ;  that  track  the  germ  of  a 
disease  and  find  its  remedy  ;  that  open  new  spiritual 
horizons — to  these  it  is  given  to  win  victories 
which  help  all  and  hurt  none.  More  and  more  the 
fighting  element  in  man  will  find  in  this  noblest 
arena  the  scene  of  its  energies  and  rewards. 

Nevertheless,  there  is  a  victory  over  persons,  a 

worthy  and  a  notable  one,  the  joy  of  which  we  may 

all  legitimately  seek.     It  is  not  one  of  coercion, 

of  subjugation  in  any  form.     The  world  has  tried 

that   long   enough,    with    an   invariable   result   of 

disaster.     Far  back  in  history  Asoka,  the  Buddhist 

king,  one  of  earth's  wisest,  struck  the  true  note  in 

that  wonderful  saying,  "  They  must  not  think  that 

conquests  by  means  of  arrows  deserve  the  name  of 

conquest ;  they  are  but  disturbances  and  violence. 

The  conquests  of  religion  alone  are  real  conquests. 

They   hold   good   for   this   world   and   the   next." 

And  even  here  we  have  to  discriminate.     There 

are  moral  conquests  that  are  conquests  by  violence. 

They  represent  the  breaking  down  of  a  man's  own 

individuality  by  an  unlawful  pressure.    We  are  only 

on  the  right  track  when  we  have  recognised  that  the 

fight  here  is  not  to  subdue  a  man's  will,  but  to  help 

him  to  assert  it.     The  battle  for  us  all  finally  is  in 

that  viewless  realm  the  republic  of  the  soul.    And 

here  we  can  fight  for  others  as  well  as  for  ourselves. 

We  may  well  bear  a  hand  for  our  neighbour  in 

the  mortal  struggle  of  his  nobler  part,  his  spiritual 

faculty,  to  assert  itself  over  the  lower  powers  that 

war  against  it.       The  battle  for  you  and  me  is 

not  that  we  may  master  our  fellow,  and  so  rule  over 


THE  ETHICS  OF  VICTORY  183 

him,  but  to  help  him  to  that  self-mastery  which, 
when  everywhere  achieved,  will  give  us  a  com- 
munity of  nobly  independent  personalities,  each 
giving  of  his  best  to  his  brethren,  and  all  guided  by 
the  same  Divine,  universal  law. 

To  sum  up.  The  experience  yielded  by  our  long 
world-history  should  enable  us  to  discern  the  true 
and  false,  the  noble  and  the  base,  in  victory.  No 
instructed  spirit  will  find  its  joy  in  the  humiliation 
of  others.  Its  triumphs  will  be  in  results,  whose 
benefits  are  for  all,  opponents  included.  Such  a  soul 
works  for  causes,  and  not  for  aims  that  end  in  self. 
In  the  personal  sphere  there  will  be  no  moral 
coercion,  but  only  a  help  to  self-mastery.  Finally, 
external  victories  will  be  judged  by  their  spiritual 
contents.  A  resounding  outside  triumph  may  in 
this  view  be  the  most  serious  of  defeats,  and  the 
outside  disaster  the  noblest  victory.  The  greatest 
of  all  human  achievements  was  the  ascent  to  a 
Cross. 


XIX 
The  Soul's  Distillations 

THE  title  expresses  only  a  part  of  what  we  propose 
here  to  deal  with.  It  is  an  affair  not  simply  of  dis- 
tillations, but^of  extractions,  of  subtilisations, 
the  whole  of  the  processes  in  short  by  which  raw 
material  is  refined,  transmuted,  raised  to  a  higher 
power.  We  want  to  inquire  whether  "anything 
similar  to  this  is  to  be  found  in  the  inner  life  of  the 
soul.  We  are  all  more  or  less  familiar  with  the 
outside  operations.  At  Cognac  there  are  great 
establishments  where  we  may  watch  the  turning 
of  wine  into  brandy.  It  is  a  distillation.  Else- 
where men  obtain  spirit  from  beet-root,  from 
potatoes  and  other  sugar  compounds.  In  other 
directions  we  have  subtle  essences,  where  the  force 
spread  originally  over  a  vast  quantity  of  the  originat- 
ing material  has  been  concentrated  into  a  few 
drops^The  greatest  triumph  of  modern  extraction 
is  the  miracle  of  radium,  where,  out  of  tons  of 
quartz,  crushed,  pounded,  passed  through  one 
process  after  another,  we  see  emerging  at  the  end 
a  substance  which  stands  as  the  very  quintessence 
of  energy  ;  a  substance  into  one  ounce  of  which 
is  compressed  a  power  computed  to  be  capable 

181 


THE  SOUL'S  DISTILLATIONS  185 

of  raising  10,000  tons  a  mile  high.  It  would  seem 
as  though  the  material  progress  of  the  world,  the 
whole  triumph  of  man  in  this  sphere,  will  become 
more  and  more  an  affair  of  this  concentration  of 
energy  ;  of  the  elaboration  of  methods  by  which  the 
power  of  winds  and  waves,  of  the  solid  earth  and  its 
elements,  will  be  distilled  into  new  and  ever  subtler 
forms,  obedient  to  his  lightest  touch.  ,- 

With  this  before  us  we  may  now  come  to  our 
special  inquiry.  Does  the  inward  life  in  any  degree 
correspond  in  this  aspect  to  the  outer  ?  Have  we 
there  also  what,  with  any  accuracy,  may  be  called 
distillations  or  extractions  ?  Do  we  discern  in 
the  soul  such  a  thing  as  ^he  conversion  of  raw 
material,  the  raising  it  to  a  new  quality  and  power  1 
The  inquiry  is  not  a  merely  speculative  one.  It  opens 
up  questions  of  the  utmost  importance  in  psycho- 
logy, in  religion,  and  the  general  conduct  of  life. 

We  cannot  look  long  into  the  nature  of  the  life 
within  us  without  coming  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  analogy  is  a  very  close  one.  As  we  think  the 
matter  over  we  begin  to  suspect,  indeed,  that<£he 
soul  is  the  greatest  of  all  distilleries.  Its  one  busi- 
ness is  a  transmutation,  an  obtaining  and  using 
of  essences^  The  soul  begins  by  distilling  for 
itself  a  J^ojjy.  According  to  an  eminent  French 
psychologist,  M.  Delanne,  the  theory  that  best 
fits  modern  research  is  that  "  a  human  being 
is  a  psychic  form  which  assimilates  matter.  When 
its  energy  is  exhausted  it  assimilates  matter  no 
longer,  the  physical  body  is  disintegrated,  and 
the  soul  in  another  form  pursues  its  career."  "  A 
mere  hypothesis,"  says  someone,  "  and  a  disput- 


186        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

able  one."  It  may  be  disputed,  we  admit.  But 
whatever  view  we  may  take  as  to  the  precise  form 
in  which  the  relation  of  soul  and  body  is  pre- 
sented, we  have  all  to  acknowledge  the  wonder  of 
that  unknown  energy  by  which  out  of  air  and  water, 
out  of  vegetable  and  animal,  the  unseen  something 
within  is  extracting  perpetually  the  thing  we  call 
our  visible  selves. 

What  is  quite  certain  also  is  that  the  outside 
world,  as  we  recognise  it,  is  a  distillation  of  our  own 
mind.  When  we  speak  of  seeing  sun,  moon  and 
stars,  the  world  and  our  fellow  men,  what  we  mean 
is  that  we  receive  certain  ether  vibrations  on  our 
retina,  which  are  translated,  by  some  process  un- 
known, into  sensations,  to  which  then,  by  another 
process,  we  attach  certain  ideas.  In  a  sense  we  all 
make  our  world.  That  it  agrees  with  the  world 
our  neighbour  makes  is,  we  may  say,  a  guarantee 
of  harmonious  mental  co-operation,  and  a  help  to 
the  belief  that  our  sensation  has  some  solid  relation 
to  the  outside  reality.  But  what,  after  all,  lies 
behind  sight,  touch,  hearing,  and  our  other  sense 
perceptions  is  ever  the  unknown.  We  know  our 
distillation  ;  that  is  all. 

With  that  as  a  beginning — a  somewhat  bewilder- 
ing one  it  must  be  confessed — let  us  come  to  some 
processes  in  which  we  may  feel  more  at  home. 
On  this  theme  we  find  ourselves  dealing,  not  only 
with  our  individual  consciousness,  but  with  that 
universal  consciousness,  that  world  soul,  if  we  may 
so  term  it,  in  which  our  own  swims,  and  of  which 
it  forms  a  part.  We  belong,  we  discover,  to  a  mental 
universe  which  has  been  made  what  it  is  by  an 


THE  SOUL'S  DISTILLATIONS  187 

age-long  series  of  distillings  and  extrac tings.  Our 
language  is  one  of  these  results.  When  we  use  such 
words  as  "  whiteness,"  "  humanity,"  any  abstract 
term  in  short,  we  are  handling  mental  tools  which 
it  took  our  remote  ancestors  thousands  of  years 
to  fashion.  Out  of  a  multitude  of  objects  con- 
stantly presenting  themselves  to  his  mind,  man, 
bit  by  bit,  sorted  out  words  that  covered  not  only 
one  of  these  objects,  but  a  multitude  of  them,  and 
enabled  him  to  think  from  the  particular  to  the 
general.  A  more  striking  mental  distillation  is  that 
of  scientific  discovery.  An  observer,  planted 
down  amidst  a  heterogeneous  congeries  of  appar- 
ently isolated  facts,  watches,  compares,  experi- 
ments, until,  it  may  be  suddenly,  as  in  a  flash, 
there  takes  place  in  his  brain  a  kind  of  precipitation. 
Out  of  the  seeming  confusion  he  has  extracted  a 
law  which  makes  all  plain.  Or  he  has  struck  on 
the  application  of  a  force — steam  it  may  be,  or 
electricity — which  henceforth  quadruples  human 
powers.  What  has  come  to  this  solitary  soul, 
this  new  distillation  from  the  outside,  comes  next 
into  the  world-soul.  The  new  generation  is  born 
with  this  extraction — this  fresh  power  essence — as 
part  of  its  inheritance.  The  world-soul  will  con- 
tinually add  to  these  acquisitions,  until  it  becomes 
mighty  beyond  our  present  dreams. 

Where  this  view  of  things  grips  us  as  individuals 
will,  however,  be  seen  more  clearly  when  we  study 
some  of  its  practical  applications.  We  note,  for 
instance,  how  our  spiritual  culture  to-day  is  an  affair 
of  inner  distillations.  Take,  for  instance,  the  present 
position  of  religion.  It  is  offered  to  us  externally 


188        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

as  a  matter  of  Bibles,  of  creeds,  of  churches,  and 
their  allied  institutions.  A  great  deal  of  the 
material  here  is  crude  enough.  Much  of  what  our 
fathers  accepted  as  facts  has  become  legend.  Many 
of  the  credal  statements  held  throughout  genera- 
tions as  necessary  to  faith  are  to  us  incredible.  We 
can  no  longer  say  credo  quia  impossibile.  Yet  faith 
lives  and  the  churches  thrive.  Never  was  religion 
more  active,  more  potent  in  the  lives  of  men.  Why 
is  this  ?  We  discover  the  secret  in  the  soul's 
method  of  inner  extraction.  The  institutions,  the 
theologies,  the  sacred  books  are  there,  and  of 
service,  not  for  what  they  are  in  themselves. 
They  are  the  materials  in  a  process.  Out  of  them, 
with  all  their  roughness,  their  inequality  of  value, 
their  nearer  or  farther  approximation  to  fact, 
the  soul,  by  its  own  infallible  methods,  has  in  each 
age  extracted  the  nutriment  it  needed,  and  to-day 
its  organs  are  performing  the  same  office.  (It  is 
not  because  the  churches  have  maintained  this  or 
that  opinion  that  they  have  lived,>  It  is  because 
they  have  stood  age  after  age  close  to  the  souls  of 
men;  stood  there  with  a  history, ,  an  example,  a 
force,  out  of  which  these  souls  direw  love  and 
courage,  and  the  spirit  of  brotherly  service.  The 
material  itself  is,  we  say,  open  to  every  criticism, 
but  these  essences  extracted  from  it  are  beyond 
criticism,  and  are  the  life  of  the  world. 

The  truth  of  this  statement  can  be  discerned 
by  anyone  who  cares  to  study  history.  We  make 
the  direst  of  blunders  if  we  judge  of  the  Church's 
function  in  any  generation  by  its  outward  symbols. 
Am  I  to  judge  of  the  early  Benedictines  by  their 


THE  SOUL'S  DISTILLATIONS  189 

theology  ?  I  think  rather  of  them  issuing  in  the 
sixth  century  from  Southern  Italy  to  cover  Europe 
with  their  faithful  labours,  making  waste  places 
fertile  with  the  toil  of  their  hands,  and  preserving 
for  us  the  ancient  literatures  by  the  labour  of  their 
brains.  Is  the  thirteenth  century  Church  a  mere 
triumph  of  the  Papacy  ?  We  look  beneath  to  see 
a  spirit  developed  as  truly  evangelical,  as  passionate 
for  truth,  for  righteousness,  for  the  soul's  freedom 
as  the  world  has  ever  known.  Nay,  for  a  proper 
view  here  we  must  extend  our  survey  beyond 
Christendom.  Let  us  read  our  Plutarch  on  the 
true  inwardness  of  the  ancient  religious  feasts. 
Says  he  :  "  For  it  is  not  abundance  of  wine  and 
well-baked  meats  that  gladden  our  hearts  in  a  reli- 
gious festival ;  it  is  our  good  hope  and  belief  that 
God  Himself  is  graciously  present  and  approving 
our  acts."  The  outward  material  here,  we  say, 
is  "  a  pagan  festival."  But  words  like  these  show 
us  how  true  souls  extracted  from  the  materials  their 
age  and  place  offered,  those  essences  of  faith  and  love 
which  are  religion's  highest  and  ultimate  meaning. 

It  is  most  interesting,  in  this  connection,  to  note 
how  men  who  have  fought  most  stoutly  for  their 
own  separate  formulas  have  come  sooner  or  later 
to  realise  the  truth  of  our  doctrine  here.  They 
find  that  the  root  of  the  matter  lies  not  in  the 
"  ism  "  they  quarrelled  about,  but  in  the  distillation 
it  yielded.  Wesley  in  his  old  age  declares  himself 
sick  of  opinions.  "  My  soul  loathes  the  frothy 
food.  Give  me  solid  and  substantial  religion ; 
give  me  a  humble,  gentle  lover  of  God  and  man  ; 
a  man  full  of  mercy  and  good  faith,  without  par- 


190         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

tiality  and  without  hypocrisy  ;  a  man  laying  himself 
out  in  the  work  of  faith,  the  patience  of  hope,  the 
labour  of  love.  Let  my  soul  be  with  those  Chris- 
tians, wheresoever  they  are  and  whatsoever  opinions 
they  are  of."  On  the  opposite  side  let  us  hear 
Martineau.  "  In  Biblical  interpretation  I  derive 
from  Calvin  and  Whitby  the  help  that  fails  me 
in  Crell  and  Belsham.  In  devotional  literature 
and  religious  thought  I  find  nothing  of  ours  that 
does  not  fail  before  Augustine,  Tauler  and  Pascal. 
And  in  the  poetry  of  the  Church  it  is  the  Latin  or 
the  German  hymns,  or  the  lines  of  Charles  Wesley, 
or  of  Keble,  that  fasten  on  my  memory  and  heart, 
and  make  all  else  seem  poor  and  feeble."  We  may 
go  beyond  Martineau  to  Huxley,  who  testified  in  a 
letter  to  Kingsley  that,  outside  theology,  life  had 
taught  him  a  deep  sense  of  religion,  that  love  had 
opened  to  him  the  sanctity  of  human  nature, 
and  impressed  him  with  a  deep  sense  of  responsi- 
bility. These  men  in  their  several  stations  had  been 
surrounded  with  materials  widely  differing  in  outer 
character.  They  belonged  to  schools  of  sharply 
opposed  thinking.  But  it  was  not  these  oppositions ; 
it  was  the  invisible  essences  their  souls  drew  from 
the  outward  surrounding  that  make  their  memories 
alike  dear  to-day  to  all  who  love  truth  and  goodness. 
As  with  outside  substance  so  in  the  soul  there  are 
double  and  quintuple  distillations.  A  man  pours 
his  discourse  upon  me.  It  is  powerful  because  it  is 
the  essence  of  his  own  life  experience.  But  to  be 
of  profit  to  me  I  must  make  an  extract  of  this  ex- 
tract. We  do  the  utmost  damage  to  ourselves 
if_we  allow  any  other  man  to  make  us  in  his  own 


THE  SOUL'S  DISTILLATIONS  191 

image.  I  must  instead  distil  from  his  individuality 
the  drop  that  feeds  my  own.  It  is  also  in  the  light 
of  this  doctrine  that  we  discern  the  meaning  of  the 
human  passions.  We  understand  by  it  that  striking 
phrase  of  Vauvenargue's  that  "  we  perhaps  owe 
the  greatest  advantages  of  the  spirit  to  our  pas- 
sions." The  man  who  prospers  most  inwardly  is 
not  the  monk  or  ascetic,  who  denies  half  his  nature. 
It  is  he  rather  who,  recognising  within  their  true 
limits  the  social  and  passional  instincts,  uses  them 
as  material  from  which,  in  co-operation  with  the 
higher  spiritual  powers,  he  develops  that  highest  love 
in  which  he  sees  his  relation  to  the  Divine  nature. 
P"  There  seems  no  limit  to  this  power  of  the  soul. 
It  can  distil  and  doubly  distil,  until  it  has  become  a 
repository  of  all  the  forces.  From  the  rough  ex- 
periences of  his  life  a  man  draws  the  need  and  then 
the  power  of  faith  and  of  prayer.  These  first 
spiritual  acquisitions  become  in  their  turn  the 
material  for  others,  more  refined  and  yet  more 
powerful.  The  process,  in  some  great  natures,  has 
continued  until  their  simplest  word  has  fallen  as  fire 
on  the  souls  of  men,  and  kindled  conflagrations  there. 
The  doctrine,  so  potent  in  its  applications  for 
this  life,  supplies  us  with  what  seems  the  best  of 
clues  to  the  life  beyond.  All  the  distillations  are  a 
step  upward  ;  a  movement  from  a  lower  to  a  higher 
quality  and  power.  On  this  analogy  death  will 
be  the  human  step  upward.  It  will  be  the  transmu- 
tation of  our  experiences  here — our  sorrows,  joys, 
knowledges,  our  triumphs  and  failures — into  an 
existence  which  is  the  essence  of  them  all,  while 
immeasurably  more  than  they. 


XX 
Our   Unordained  Ministry 

THE  education  question  has  had  a  front  place  on 
the  national  programme  for  some  years  now,  but 
it  is  doubtful  whether  the  English  people  are  yet 
awake  to  its  real  significance.  We  are  deep  in 
the  politics  of  the  matter.  What  is  called  "  the 
religious  question  "  absorbs  public  attention.  And 
religion  here  stands  for  the  quarrel  of  the  denomi- 
nations. When  we  talk  "  education "  we  mean 
the  legislation  of  recent  years.  But  this  phase 
of  the  question,  important  and  exciting  though  it  be, 
is  after  all  merely  temporary  and  incidental.  It  is 
only  when  we  are  through  this  debatable  land,  at 
its  farther  side,  that  we  face  the  real  facts  of  the 
position.  The  actual  question,  beside  which  all 
other  matters  are  trivial,  is  as  to  the  making  of 
England,  and  the  part  our  schools  are  to  play  in  the 
process.  That,  we  repeat,  is  the  aspect  of  educa- 
tion to  which  the  nation  has  yet  to  be  awakened. 
It  is  not  in  the  least  degree  alive  to  the  potentialities 
hidden  in  the  common  school.  The  religious 
bodies  have  of  late  been  much  exercised  as  to  the 
actual  influence  they  are  exerting  upon  the  national 
life.  They  are  in  doubt  as  to  whether  it  increases 

IM 


OUR  UNORDAINED  MINISTRY         193 

or  declines.  The  statistics  of  church  attendance  have 
certainly  had  no  great  encouragement  to  offer. 
They  show  a  vast  and  growing  population  that  lies 
outside  their  reach. 

But  side  by  side  with  the  church,  with  its  empty 
seats,  stands  the  school,  which  is  always  full.  Here 
is  a  teaching  institution,  the  church,  shall  we  say, 
of  the  young,  which  knows  of  no  dissenters  and 
practically  of  no  absentees.  It  is  the  one  moral 
instructor  left  us  which  can  back  its  appeal  with 
authority.  There  was  a  time  when  the  Church 
had  this  power.  Buckle,  amongst  others,  has  given 
us  a  vivid  picture  of  Presbyterian  ascendency  in 
earlier  Scottish  days,  when  non-attendance  at 
service  without  adequate  reason  was  visited  with 
heavy  penalties.  But  the  Church  to-day,  of  what- 
ever name,  in  Scotland  as  elsewhere,  has  lost  its 
coercive  power.  Its  only  claim  on  the  multitude 
is  by  the  attractions  it  offers. 

But  the  school,  as  moral  and  spiritual  guide,  has 
other  present-day  advantages  over  the  church. 
Its  congregation,  vast  with  the  vastness  of  the  entire 
juvenile  population,  and  subject  to  no  vicissitudes, 
to  no  ebb  and  flow  of  popularity,  is  a  congregation 
meeting  not  for  one  day  in  the  week  only,  but 
almost  every  day.  Here  is  an  influence  which, 
instead  of  obtruding  itself  once  a  week,  as  does  the 
church,  into  a  whirlpool  of  other  and  often  conflict- 
ing forces,  occupies  for  a  term  of  years  practically 
the  whole  mind  of  the  pupil.  More  than  that.  The 
school  possesses  this  unlimited  sway  at  the  time 
when  of  all  others  the  soul  is  most  impressionable, 
the  most  retentive,  the  most  plastic  to  the  hand 

13 


194        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

that  forms  it.  Nothing  holds  us  like  the  early 
memories.  They  have  the  supreme  advantage  of 
being  the  first  in  the  field.  The  old  man,  who 
forgets  all  else  of  his  life,  remembers  the  things  of 
his  boyhood.  The  mind  becomes  afterwards  a 
palimpsest  on  which  a  thousand  other  characters 
are  imprinted.  But  the  school  teacher  has  the 
first  use  of  the  parchment. 

This,  then,  is  the  situation.  The  England  of  the 
future  is  being  mentally  and  morally  born  in  the 
common  school.  Here  its  shape  and  size  are  being 
given  to  it.  According  to  what  our  school  is  the 
nation  will  be.  Are  we  clear  yet  as  to  what  our 
school  is  and  ought  to  be  ?  Have  we  taken  the 
correct  measure  of  this  -stupendous  instrument  ? 
Have  we  inquired  as  to  the  kind  of  work  it  should 
be  set  to  ?  Have  we  properly  estimated  the 
position  and  responsibilities  of  that  vast  army  of 
teachers  of  both  sexes  who  are  its  directing  forces  ? 
Are  they  in  their  turn  awake  to  the  real  magnitude 
of  their  calling  ?  Do  they  know  themselves  as, 
though  unordained,  the  greatest  ministry  which 
England  to-day  possesses  ?  It  may  be  well,  in 
the  light  of  questions  of  this  sort,  to  probe  the  position 
a  little  more  closely. 

We  have  spoken  of  the  common  school  as  the 
children's  church,  of  the  teachers  as  an  unordained 
ministry.  But  this,  it  will  be  said,  is  just  bringing 
us  back  into  our  present  squabbles.  Instead  of 
keeping  outside  the  debatable  ground  it  plumps 
us  into  the  very  middle  of  it.  It  is  the  religious 
question  over  again.  Yes,  truly,  we  answer,  a  reli- 
gious question,  but  not  that  of  the  old  contro- 


OUR  UNORDAINED  MINISTRY         195 

versies.  The  present  need,  as  we  conceive  it,  is 
for  a  view  of  the  school  and  its  functions  which 
shall  at  one  and  the  same  time  stay  the  religious 
quarrel  and  recreate  the  nation.  A  recent  book 
which  has  created  much  attention,  has  been  pub- 
lished under  the  title,  "  Bushido  ;  or,  the  Soul  of 
Japan."  The  point  now  is  whether  there  be  not 
such  a  thing  as  "  the  soul  of  England,"  and  whether 
that  soul  cannot  be  made  the  inspiration  and  the 
governing  power  of  our  school  life. 

In  the  work  just  mentioned  we  are  told  how  certain 
ideas,  sentiments  and  traditions,  handed  down 
from  generation  to  generation,  and  wrought  into 
the  very  fibre  of  the  people,  have  made  Japan 
what  it  is.  In  that  exposition  we  have  the  key 
to  the  secret  of  effective  education.  It  is  first  and 
last  an  affair  of  soul.  Amid  the  clash  of  our  present 
controversies  there  is  a  thing  on  which  all  honest 
men  are  agreed,  and  it  is  that  the  one  prime  asset 
of  a  man  and  of  a  people  is  character  ;  the  one 
problem  is  how  to  produce  it.  The  school  that 
cannot  get  this  as  a  result,  whatever  else  it  can 
offer,  is  a  failure.  You  may  teach  handwriting 
and  equip  a  forger  ;  you  may  have  a  chemistry  class 
and  turn  out  expert  poisoners  and  bomb-throwers. 
"  Clever  men,"  said  Huxley,  "  are  as  common  as 
blackberries  ;  the  rare  thing  is  to  find  a  good  one." 

But  how  are  we  going  to  get  character,  virtue, 
our  "  good  man,"  out  of  the  school  ?  Plato,  in  more 
than  one  place,  elaborates  the  thesis  that  virtue 
cannot  be  taught.  And  assuredly  you  cannot 
teach  it  as  you  teach  arithmetic.  And  you  cannot 
get  it,  though  masses  of  men  are  not  yet  convinced 


196        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCED 

of  this,  by  teaching  theological  dogmas.  Of  all  the 
experiments  for  putting  a  soul  into  the  new  gener- 
ation, that  of  compelling  it  to  parrot  off  abstruse 
metaphysical  propositions  to  which  the  boy  and 
girl  mind  brings  neither  the  remotest  comprehen- 
sion nor  the  slightest  sympathy,  is  at  once  the  most 
dismal  and  the  most  stupid.  Moreover,  the  now 
proved  impossibility  of  bringing  the  rival  denomi- 
nations to  any  agreement  in  dogmatic  teaching 
bars  the  way  to  any  further  experiments  of  this 
kind  in  the  common  schools.  We  have  to  face 
the  problem  of  securing  the  one  prime  asset  of 
character,  of  getting  into  the  body  and  brain  of  our 
youth  the  highest  soul  of  the  nation,  apart  from  the 
catechisms  of  warring  Churches. 

Is  there  a  way  ?  For  answer  we  have  only  to 
question  the  human  experience.  And,  fortunately, 
we  have  for  this  purpose  such  an  array  of  evidence 
as  never  before  has  been  open  to  the  inquirer. 
We  have  a  world-history  which  goes  back  for 
thousands  of  years  ;  we  have  documects,  books 
and  monuments  which  lay  bare  the  secret  of  all 
the  religions.  And  from  them  we  can  with  some 
certainty  deduct  the  way  in  which  virtue  has  been 
acquired.  We  learn  that  if  it  cannot  be  taught 
it  can  be  caught — as  a  contagion  is  caught.  Inside 
of  every  religion  has  been  a  soul,  and  it  is  this 
soul  whose  secret  essence  has  penetrated  the  human 
heart  and  stirred  it  to  goodness.  This  soul  of  the 
religions  offers  nothing  to  fight  against ;  it  is  not  a 
dogma  to  be  combated,  but  an  atmosphere  to  be 
breathed.  It  has  dwelt  in  different  degrees  in  all 
the  nations  and  all  the  faiths.  We  are  learning 


OUR  UNORDAINED  MINISTRY         197 

now  the  varying  expressions  which  it  took  amongst 
the  peoples.  Even  the  definitions  are  wonderfully 
alike  ;  but  we  discover  that  the  spirit  was  always 
greater  than  the  definition.  Listen  to  some  of 
its  voices.  The  religion  of  Zoroaster,  according  to 
Beausobre,  consisted  in  "  purity  of  faith,  in  sincerity 
and  honesty  of  speech,  and  in  the  justice  and  holiness 
of  actions."  In  China,  Lao-Tse  gives  as  his  great 
principle  :  "To  the  good  I  would  be  good.  To 
the  not  good  I  would  also  be  good,  in  order  to 
make  them  good."  In  Greece,  we  know  the  insis- 
tence with  which  Socrates  taught  that  it  was  in- 
finitely better  to  suffer  injustice  than  to  do  it.  In 
India,  the  Buddhist  King  Asoka  defined  religion 
as  "  the  least  possible  evil,  much  good,  piety, 
charity,  veracity,  and  also  purity  of  life." 

In  England  the  moral  driving  power  for  long 
generations  has  been  Christianity.  But  the  power 
here  has  not  been  the  theological  formula,  but  the 
soul  which  the  Gospel  contained  and  the  person- 
alities in  which  it  lived.  A  man  may  oppose 
its  formulated  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  or  of  the 
Eucharist,  but  no  man  opposes  its  fountains  of 
tenderness,  its  spirit  of  philanthropy,  its  passion 
for  purity,  its  aspiration  for  the  perfect.  The  best 
men  in  every  age  have  seen  that  its  reality  lay  here. 
Zwingli  says  so  in  his  declaration  that  "  faith  does 
not  depend  on  the  discussions  of  men,  but  has  its 
seat  and  rests  itself  invincibly  in  the  soul."  Pascal 
from  his  side  finds  the  same  thing  ;  the  perfect  faith, 
he  holds,  is  God  felt  in  the  heart  (Dieu  sensible  au 
cceur).  And  Froude  expresses  the  mind  of  our 
time  in  his  plea  to  "  have  done  with  theological 


198        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

refinements.  There  is  an  excuse  for  the  Fathers 
because  the  heretics  forced  them  to  define  particular 
points.  But  every  definition  is  a  misfortune.  .  .  . 
Inquire  if  you  will,  but  do  not  define.  Then  we 
shall  have  no  more  quarrels,  and  religion  will  take 
hold  on  life." 

Now  it  is  this  undefined  soul  of  Christianity,  as 
exhibited  in  its  love,  its  purity,  its  fidelity  to  duty, 
its  reverence  and  aspiration  for  the  highest,  by 
whose  means  the  schools,  without  hurting  any 
man's  conscience,  may  be  made  the  regenerators 
of  England.  This  soul,  to  find  its  way  into  the 
new  generation,  must  be  incarnated  in  the  teachers 
who  instruct  it.  Religion  is  to  be,  not  on  their 
lips  as  a  dogma,  but  in  their  hearts  as  a  life.  It 
should  be  found  in  the  school  not  as  a  babble 
of  catechisms  but  as  the  ceaseless  intake  of  an 
atmosphere.  At  work  in  our  schools  we  need  not 
merely  the  drill  of  the  daily  lesson,  but  also  a  con- 
tagion of  goodness.  It  was  a  conviction  of  Cobden's 
that  good  examples  are  more  influential  than  bad 
ones.  And  nowhere  does  a  good  example  tell  so 
mightily  as  upon  the  soul  of  a  child.  Here  are 
your  true  hero-worshippers.  At  such  an  age  the 
simple  passing  of  a  good  man,  a  stray  word  from  him, 
may  leave  an  indelible  impression.  When  Welling- 
ton was  a  boy,  Wesley,  who  was  of  the  same  family, 
gave  him  a  Bible,  the  "  Imitation,"  and  a  book  by 
Jeremy  Taylor.  The  Iron  Duke  continued  to  read 
these  to  the  end  of  his  life. 

The  whole  bearing  of  this  argument  narrows 
then  to  one  point — the  teacher.  The  tens  of 
thousands  of  our  English  men  and  women  who 


OUR  UNORDAINED  MINISTRY         199 

have  given  themselves  to  the  work  of  the  common 
school,  are,  we  believe,  amongst  the  worthiest  of 
the  land.  We  shall  not  offend  them  however,  we 
trust,  when  we  say  that  great  masses  of  them 
have  scarcely  risen  yet  to  the  full  height  of  their 
vocation.  They  have  not  realised  how  great 
their  office,  how  vast  the  trust  reposed  in  them 
by  the  nation.  The  worst  is  that  the  nation  itself 
does  not  realise  it,  and  so  belittles  their  work.  But 
that  must  end.  Carlyle,  in  a  memorable  passage, 
gives  his  view  of  the  transcendent  value  to  the 
State  of  the  true  schoolmaster.  Scotland  has  been 
made  by  its  schools,  and  England  can  be.  Far  be  it 
from  us  to  underrate  the  power  of  the  Churches, 
and  of  whatever  other  moral  forces  are  at  work  in 
our  midst.  But  we  repeat  the  destinies  of  England 
lie  in  our  schools.  We  shall  be  on  the  way  to  the 
greatest  things  when  our  teachers,  "  our  unordained 
ministry  "  by  study,  by  self-discipline,  by  every 
physical,  mental,  and,  above  all,  by  every  spiritual 
reinforcement,  seek  to  gain  the  fullest  height  of 
their  own  soul,  that  upon  those  little  ones,  who  are 
the  nation  that  is  to  be,  they  may  pour  forth  the 
treasure  of  its  secret  life. 


XXI 
The    Solitaries 

THAT  is  a  suggestive  word  of  Charles  Lamb  where, 
in  a  letter  to  Coleridge,  he  speaks  of  "  the  silent 
thoughts  arising  in  a  good  man's  mind  in  lonely 
places."  For  truly  it  is  life's  "  lonely  places  " 
that  have  been  among  our  chief  formers  and  teachers. 
It  is  the  men  who  have  loved  solitude  and  under- 
stood it — the  true  solitaries — who  have  been  the 
mediators  to  humanity  of  its  most  precious  things. 
Nature,  one  might  think,  had  taken  this  into  special 
account  in  fitting  up  the  earth  for  our  dwelh'ng- 
place.  She  has  made  provision  for  the  solitaries. 
The  race  grows  with  amazing  rapidity,  and  we  talk  of 
our  overcrowded  world.  But  there  are  silent  spots 
in  it  yet,  and  will  always  be.  And  how  immense 
is  their  attraction  !  ^The  great  mountains  draw  us 
partly  because,  in  their  aloofness  and  upward  point- 
ing aspiration,  they  are  the  image  of  our  own 
souO  Do  our  readers  know  that  view  of  Mont 
Blanc  from  Sallenches  ?  We  have  gazed  upon  it 
time  and  again  with  an  indescribable  fascination  ; 
and  always  with  those  words  of  Michelet  in  mind  : 
"  From  a  close  view-point  one  sees  it  in  all  its 
loftiness,  alone,  an  immense  white  monk,  buried 

200 


THE  SOLITARIES  201 

in  its  cloak  and  hood  of  ice,  dead,  and  yet  standing 
erect.  .  .  .  Mont  Blanc  leads  nowhere ;  it  is 
a  hermit  apparently,  wrapped  up  in  its  solitary 
musings." 

The  sense  of  solitude,  so  far  as  Nature  can  give  it, 
reaches  its  highest  point  at  night  among  the  moun- 
tains. The  present  writer  will  never  forget  the 
sensations  of  a  moonlight  ride  through  a  lonely 
valley  in  Norway.  Beyond  the  rock  wall  that  enclosed 
us  we  caught  glimpses  of  interminable  wastes  of 
ice  and  snow,  gleaming  high  up  there  in  the  cold 
rays  of  the  moon.  The  imagination  flew  into  the  far 
recesses  of  these  inaccessible  heights,  and  drank  its 
fill  of  their  awful  silence.  We  seemed  to  feel  here 

The  wind  that  shrills  all  night 

In  a  waste  land  where  no  man  comes, 

Or  hath  come  since  the  making  of  the  world. 

But  these  far  retreats  of  mountain  and  of  wilder- 
ness are  not  the  only  silent  places  of  the  world. 
It  is  not  on  glacier  or  snowfield  merely  that  life 
offers  us  the  sense  of  solitude.  Men  and  women 
who  never  stirred  from  home  have  tasted  the  full 
flavour  of  it.  It  is  a  part  of  the  human  education 
that  none  of  us  misses.  But  it  requires  a  special 
taste  to  appreciate  it.  To  some  the  training  is 
entirely  irksome.  Pascal  is  perhaps  right  in  his 
remark  that  "  there  are  so  few  persons  capable  of 
enduring  solitude."  Certainly  he  is  in  that  other 
word  :  "  The  man  who  lives  only  for  himself  hates 
nothing  so  much  as  being  alone  with  himself." 
But  a  countryman  of  his,  a  century  before,  had  had 
an  education  in  this  line  of  which  he  knew  the 


202         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

value.  How  admirable  is  that  chapter  of  Montaigne 
on  solitude !  Florio,  in  his  quaint  translation, 
gives  us  the  pith  of  the  old  Gascon  :  "  We  should 
reserve  a  storehouse  for  ourselves,  altogether  ours 
and  wholly  free,  wherein  we  may  hoard  up  and 
establish  our  true  liberty  and  principal  retreat  of 
solitariness,  wherein  we  must  go  alone  to  our- 
selves, there  to  meditate,  discourse  and  laugh  as 
without  wife,  children,  and  goods,  or  train  of 
servants  ;  that  if,  by  any  occasion  they  be  lost, 
it  seem  not  strange  to  us  to  pass  it  over.  We  have 
a  mind  moving  and  turning  on  itself ;  it  may  keep 
itself  company.  In  solis  sis  tibi  turbo,  locis."  (In 
lonely  places  be  to  thyself  the  crowd.)  The  old 
essayist  was  evidently  of  the  mind  of  Scipio  Africanus, 
of  whom  Plutarch  records  that  "  he  was  never 
less  alone  than  when  he  was  alone." 

There  are  all  kinds  of  solitaries — good,  bad, 
and  indifferent,  and  that  in  the  degree  in  which 
they  have  learned  their  lesson.  But  the  lesson,  as 
we  have  said,  is  thrust  upon  us  all.  It  is  marvellous, 
considering  how  naturally  gregarious,  social,  chatter- 
ing a  being  the  average  human  is,  to  note  the 
extent  to  which  he  is  a  solitary.  Observe  our 
race  as  a  whole.  ^Humanity  is  surely  the  loneliest 
thing  in  the  universe.  Shut  off  by  its  height  from 
the  lower  animals,  it  looks  upward  and  outward 
for  companions  and  finds  none.  There  is  no  inter- 
stellar communication.  If  the  shining  orbs  yonder 
have  inhabitants  they  have,  so  far,  had  no  speech 
with  us.  The  silence  of  the  heavens  has  been  in  all 
ages  man's  baffling  mystery.  Lucretius  made  it  the 
argument  of  his  scepticism.  Our  own  day  has  been 


THE  SOLITARIES  203 

weighted  with  the  same  thought.  One  poet,  in 
two  pregnant  lines,  suggests  the  entire  modern 
query  : 

When  the  sky  which  noticed  all  makes  no  disclosure, 
And  the  earth  keeps  up  her  terrible  composure  ! 

Another  finds  here  his  doubt  of  Providence : 

Rather  some  random  throw 

Of  heedless  Nature's  die, 
'Twould  seem  that  from  so  low 

Hath  lifted  man  so  high. 
Through  untold  aeons  vast 

She  let  him  lurk  and  cower  ; 
'Twould  seem  he  climbed  at  last, 

In  mere  fortuitous  hour, 
Chilci  of  a  thousand  chances  'neath  the  indinerent  sky. 

There  is,  indeed,  nothing  more  striking  in  modern 
thought  than  this  sense  of  this  human  loneliness,  of 
our  apparent  isolation  in  the  universe.  It  has 
obsessed  all  classes  of  thinkers,  who  have  expressed 
the  feeling  in  their  several  ways.  Lamennais,  a 
solitary  if  ever  there  was  one,  speaks  of  man  as  the 
most  suffering  of  creatures,  because  torn  asunder 
between  two  worlds.  Taine,  sceptic  and  hopeless, 
bemoans  humanity  "  dragging  its  incurable  hurt 
along  the  roads  which  Time  opens  to  it."  Schopen- 
hauer, destroyer  that  he  is,  is  yet  sure  that  the 
mystery  has  some  deep  solution  behind  it.  "If 
this  existence  were  the  ultimate  goal  of  the  world 
it  would  be  the  most  senseless  ever  contrived, 
whether  it  were  ourselves  or  any  other  who  fixed 
it." 

But  this  apparent  isolation  of  the  race  as  such, 


204        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

so  baffling  to  the  human  intellect,  so  trying  to  its 
faith,  does  not  complete  the  statement  of  our 
solitude.  {  On  the  life  journey  there  come  to  us 
varieties  of  it,  each  with  a  flavour  of  its  own.  We 
doubt  if  there  is  ever  a  keener  sense  of  it  than 
some  children  have.  The  world  is  so  much  stranger 
to  them  than  to  us,  its  unknown  so  much  more 
terrifying.  The  agonies  endured  by  voiceless  little 
souls  left  in  the  dark  form  indeed  one  of  the  tragedies 
of  unwritten  history.  Lamb's  statement  of  his  own 
terrors  is,  we  are  sure,  not  overdrawn.  "  And  from 
his  little  midnight  pillow  this  nurse-child  of  optimism 
will  start  at  shapes,  unborrowed  of  tradition,  in 
sweats  to  which  the  reveries  of  the  cell-damned 
murderer  are  tranquillity."  And  who,  but  those 
who  have  experienced  it,  can  sound  the  depths 
of  desolation  opened  in  the  heart  of  the  timid 
schoolboy,  who,  away  for  the  first  time  in  his 
life  from  home,  awakes  in  the  night  to  know 
himself  alone  in  a  stranger  world !  It  is  a  different 
species  of  solitariness  which  awaits  us  at  life's 
farther  end.  The  sensation  of  age  is  that  of  a 
world  which  becomes  ever  fuller  in  itself  and  yet 
ever  emptier  for  us.  There  are  more  faces  in 
the  street,  but  "  the  old  familiar  faces,"  where 
are  they  ?  Steadily  that  front  rank  thins,  and 
we  ourselves,  who  aforetime  gazed  upon  it  from 
behind,  pushed  now  into  the  vacant  place,  have 
nothing  henceforth  to  look  at  but  empty  space 
and  the  coming  end. 

But  before  that  stage  is  reached  there  await 
many  of  us  special  solitudes  of  the  spirit,  painful, 
pleasurable,  never  explainable  to  our  fellows, 


THE  SOLITARIES  205 

but  always,  we  discern,  fruitful  in  their  results 
upon  life.  The  great  minds,  the  leading  spirits, 
are  by  the  law  of  their  nature  solitaries.  To  ascend 
is  to  put  a  distance  between  ourselves  and  the  crowd. 
Summits  are  cold,  lonely  places.  The  penalty  of 
greatness  is  to  be  out  of  touch  with  the  non-great — 
humanity's  larger  half.  And  the  isolation  is  at 
times  terrible.  "  I  felt  for  her,"  said  Tennyson 
once  of  the  Queen,  "  all  alone  on  that  height.  It 
is  dreadful." 


f 


The  true  gods  sigh  for  the  cost  and  the  pain 
For  the  reed  which  grows  nevermore  again 
As  a  reed  with  the  reeds  in  the  river. 


Then,  beyond  the  loneliness  of  genius,  the  loneliness 
of  high  station,  is  that  of  the  elect  spirits  to  whom 
has  been  committed  some  high  fate  of  doing  or 
suffering.  The  path  to  Calvary  has  never  wanted  for 
its  Man  of  Sorrows.  The  mid-night  shadows  of 
Gethsemane  have,  in  every  age,  fallen  upon  some 
soul  bowed  there,  heavy  with  the  weight  of  a  world. 
What  an  example  of  this,  of  a  Gethsemane  of 
lonely  suffering,  have  we  in  John  Knox's  account  of 
his  beloved  Wishart,  when  close  to  his  martyrdom  ! 
"  He  passed  forth  into  a  yard  a  little  before  day. 
When  he  had  gone  up  and  down  in  an  alley  for 
some  time,  with  many  sobs  and  deep  groans  he 
fell  upon  his  knees,  and  remaining  thus  his  groans 
increased.  From  his  knees  he  fell  upon  his  face,  and 
then  the  persons  forenamed  heard  weeping  and  an 
indistinct  sound  as  it  were  of  prayers.  Afterwards 
questioned  about  this,  he  said,  '  I  tell  you  I  am 
assured  that  my  travail  is  near  an  end.  Therefore 


206        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

call  to  God  with  me,  that  now  I  shrink  not  when 
the  battle  waxes  most  hot.' ' 

In  the  human  race  as  a  whole,  in  its  separate 
stages  of  life,  in-  the  experiences  of  elect  and  suffer- 
ing souls,  and,  as  if  sympathising  with  all  this,  in  the 
very  configuration  of  our  globe  itself,  we  are,  then, 
met  at  every  point  with  this  mystery  of  solitude, 
as  an  essential  part  of  life.  What  is  its  meaning  ? 
Is  it  by  chance  that  it  happens  so,  or  is  there  a 
purpose  here  ?  Are  we  really  alone  when  we  seem 
so  ?  These  are  the  questions.  And  it  is  precisely 
when  we  study  the  action  of  solitude  upon  the  indivi- 
dual soul  that  we  obtain  there  a  glimpse  into  what 
man's  solitude  in  the  universe  really  means.  He  is 
left  to  himself  that  he  may  grow.  It  is  precisely  in  this 
condition  that  he  does  grow,-  Gregory  of  Nazianzen 
realised  that,  when  he  "  retired  into  himself,  deem- 
ing quiet  the  only  safety  of  the  soul."  Wordsworth 
realised  it,  "  retired  in  the  sanctuary  of  his  own 
heart,  hallowing  the  Sabbath  of  his  own  thoughts." 
It  is  thus  indeed  that  all  his  great  thoughts,  all 
his  revelations,  have  come  to  man.  And  so  his  very 
isolation  is  evidence  that  he  is  guided.  His  guide 
keeps  out  of  sight,  remains  a  Deus  absconditus, 
but  not  the  less  surely  does  He  open  up  and  indicate 
the  road. 

We  have,  then,  to  comprehend  and  to  accustom 
ourselves  to  the  Cosmic  habit.  It  is  not  enough  for 
us 

To  bear 
Without  resentment  the  Divine  reserve. 

We  have  to  understand  it  and  to  achieve  in  our- 
selves all  that  it  designs  for  us.    It  is  studies  such  as 


THE  SOLITARIES  207 

these,  of  the  mere  facts  of  life,  that  show  us  faith 
in  the  New  Testament  sense  of  it,  as  the  only 
rational  solution  of  our  riddle.  Our  isolation  is  an 
insulation.  We  are  shut  off  from  visible  signs 
that  there  may  develop  in  us  the  sense  and  certitude 
of  the  invisible  Reality. 


The   Broadening  of  Life 

THE  moralist  and  the  religious  teacher  of  our 
time,  as  they  study  the  problems  the  world  offers 
to  their  thought,  are  met  at  every  turn  by  a  new 
difficulty.  It  is  the  difficulty  arising  from  the  grow- 
ing complexity  of  life.  Their  fathers,  in  both 
their  thinking  and  their  acting,  moved  within 
definitely-drawn  boundary  lines.  The  lines  limited 
the  view.Jbut  in  other  respects  were  very  con- 
venient. LTo  know  exactly  the  right  and  wrong 
of  everything  ;  what  to  accept  and  what  to  avoid ; 
to  have  a  formula  for  every  circumstance,  a  text 
for  each^contingency — all  this  wonderfully  simplified 
matters./  Let  anyone  read  the  sermons  and  religious 
treatises  of  a  generation  ago,  with  then1  clear-cut 
distinctions  between  the  Church  and  the  world, 
between  the  sacred  and  the  profane,  between  godli- 
ness and  secularity,  and  compare  all  this  with  the 
mental  attitude  of  to-day,  and  he  will  understand 
what  we  mean./  For  to-day  the  boundaries  are 
'down,  and  the  community,  intoxicated  with  a 
sense  of  freedom  and  of  a  new  country  to  be  ex- 
plored, is  wandering  at  large,  in  imminent  danger 
of  getting  lost. 

206 


THE  BROADENING  OF  LIFE  209 

An  urgent  need  of  the  hour  is  of  some  fresh  de- 
finitions which  shall  include  all  the  new  know- 
ledge, and  correctly  relate  it  to  the  business  of 
living.  And  in  no  direction  is  such  a  reconstruction 
needed  more  than  in  the  conceptions  of  "  broad  " 
and  "  narrow,"  in  religion  and  life.  Both  as  to  the 
principlesThvolved  here  and  as  to  their  applications 
one  sees  a  strange  confusion  of  thinking  which 
is  reacting  disastrously  on  both  communities  and 
individuals.  <People  are  making  the  greatest  mis- 
takes, both  about  breadth  and  narrowness  .v>  They 
praise  or  blame  the  one  and  the  other  without  any 
proper  reason.  It  is  time  we  saw  the  real  signifi- 
cance of  these  terms,  and  the  part  they  fill  in  the 
economy  of  life. 

To  begin  with,  let  us  be  sure  of  our  ground  when 
we  condemn,  as  we  are  apt  to  do,  the  "  narrowness  " 
of  our  neighbour.  We  talk  continually  of 
"  narrow  "  views  in  religion  or  in  conduct.  There 
are  such,  undoubtedly,  of  which  we  may  speak 
presently  ;  but  what  we  have  first  to  learn  on  this 
question  is  that  narrowness  is  not  in  itself  neces- 
sarily an  evil.  If  it  were,  be  sure  we  should  not 
find  it  so  continually  and  so  deeply  wrought  into 
the  innermost  processes  of  living.  "  Here,"  the 
observer  is  compelled  to  say,  after  running  up 
against  a  thousand  instances,  "  here  assuredly  is 
nature  herself,  and  she  is  always  wiser  than  we 
are."  Nature,  we  find,  is  narrow  as  well  as  broad; 
and  her  narrowness  is  as  needful  as  her  breadth. 
In  order  to  get  her  results  she  is  perpetually  limiting 
things,  shutting  them  behind  her  barriers.  She 
wraps  her  seed  up  close  till  its  time  comes  to  unfold. 

14 


210        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

She  is  continually  purchasing  intensity  at  the  cost 
of  expansion.  If  our  electric  force  is  to  deliver 
itself,  undiminished,  at  yonder  far  extremity, 
we  have  to  insulate  it.  There  must  be  no  talk  of 
itrgadth  herer  We  cannot  have  it  both  ways. 
When  we  come  to  human  life  we  see  nature  working 
,on  the  same  lines.  The  genius  of  a  given  nation  has 
been  nursed  by  a  process  of  shutting  off.  The 
variety  which  gives  the  world  half  its  charm  has 
been  reached  by  what  we  may  call  a  cellular  arrange- 
ment, in  which,  safe  from  outside  interference, 
the  separate  result  has  been  worked  out. 

Yet,  with  this  said,  and  its  truth  fully  taken  into 
account,  we  find  on  interrogation  that  nature, 
using  thus  her  tools  of  narrowness,  works  inces- 
santly towards  breadth  as  a  result.  Beginning  at 
'simple  combinations,  her  tendency  is  always  to 
a  greater  complexity.  She  widens  her  conception. 
As  we  track  her  up  the  ascending  scale  of  life, 
we  find  in  the  higher  organisms  a  repetition  of  the 
lower,  but  ever  with  some  subtle  twist  added.  The 
central  directing  agency  has  to  take  over  a  larger 
area  of  control.  The  mollusc's  simple  business 
of  opening  and  shutting  its"snell  is  succeeded  in  the 
mammal  by  a  thousand  complicated  movements. 
And  as  the  complexity  grows  there  is  accompanying 
it  a  constantly  enlarged  freedom.  The  limpet  sticks 
to  its  rock ;  the  man  roams  the  world  at  his  will. 

When  from  such  studies  as  these  we  come  to  the 
problems  of  morals  and  religion  we  find  a  similarity 
of  phenomena  which  shows  us,  on  a  higher  plane, 
the  working  of  the  self-same  process,  under  the 
self -same  guidance.  Religion,  to  secure  its  results 


211 

has  used,   and  effectively  used,   the   narrowing  in- 
stincts, and  has  therein  followed  strictly  the  order 
of  nature.    It  is  the  order  which  tells  us  that  certain \ 
blooms,  fit  for  expansion  in  May,  must  not  show  ] 
themselves  before,   on  peril  of  frostbite  and  de- 
struction.   Nature  for  some  of  her  work  makes  use 
of  human  ignorance  just  as  much  as  of  human  know-        . 
ledge.    For  a  child  of  months,  ignorance  is  a  con-     ' 
dition  of  health.    To  fill  its  brain  with  a  man's 
intelligence,  were  that  possible,  would  te  to  kill; 
it  right  off.    Precisely  the  same  thing  is  witnessed  V 
in  religious  development,  both  of  communities  and 
of  individuals. 

Christianity,  for  instance,  would  not,  humanly 
speaking,  have  won  its  victories  and  gained  its 
position  in  the  world,  apart  from  the  employment 
at  certain  periods,  of  nature's  method  of  narrow- 
ness. The  early  Christians  concentrated  on  one 
side  of  life.  They  lost  view  of  some  others,  but 
what  they  gamed  thereby,  for  t/Jiemselves  and  the 
future,  was  worth  the  sacrifice.  \^  certain  insulation 
was  required  in  the  making  of  a  martyr./  The  feel- 
ing which  led  Ignatius,  in  view  of  his'  approaching 
doom,  to  exclaim,  /'  The  wild  beasts  are  the  road 
to  God  "/or  which  enabled  Thomas  Hawker,  the 
Marian  martyr,  when  burned  at  Canterbury,  to 
raise  his  hands  in  the  flames  as  a  token  to  his  friends 
that  his  soul  was  at  peace,  required  a  special  cult 
which  had  a  certain  exclusiveness  about  it.  And 
the  faith  of  the  Church,  as  a  whole,  was  for  a  long 
while  of  too  naive  a  kind  to  bear  sudden  expansions. 
It  followed  a  true  instinct  in  looking  askance  at  new 
elements.  It  was  by  slow  degrees,  amid  much  mis- 


212        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

giving,  and  after  hard  fighting,  that  art  and  litera- 
ture, and  science  last  of  all,  found  a  place  in  it. 
As  with  the  community,  so  with  individuals.  A 
convert  hi  his  first  rapture  asks  for  nothing  beyond 
what  feeds  his  exalted  feeling.  Ignatius  Loyola 
tells  how,  in  his  early  sainthood,  he  found  secular 
studies  almost  intolerable.  They  were  the  wilder- 
ness after  paradise.  There  is,  too,  the  story  of  a 

.  Methodist  preacher  returning  an  English  grammar 
offered  him  by  a  friend  with  the  remark,  that  "  he 
could  find  nothing  about  Christ  in  it  "  ! 

v  And  all  this,  we  repeat,  is,  for  a  certain  stage  of 
development,  entirely  natural,  and  because  natural, 
wholesome.  Remember,  too,  it  is  not  religion  only 
that  has  followed  this  route.  All  the  special  ex- 
periences, all  the  expert  knowledge  by  which  the 
world  is  enriched,  have  been  reached  in  the  same 
way.  Every  specialist  is  a  disciple  of  the  narrow./ 
When  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  asked  how  long  it 
had  taken  him  to  paint  a  certain  picture,  replied, 
"  All  my  life,"  he  was  a  witness  to  this  doctrine. 
The  curious  materialism  of  the  scientists  of  the 
Victorian  era — a  materialism  now  breaking  down 
at  all  points — was  the  narrowing  effect  of  that  de- 
votion to  the  purely  physical  aspect  of  things 
which  secured  them  such  signal  gains  in  that  de- 
partment, but  at  the  price  of  colour  blindness  to 
another,  even  more  important. 

But  nature,  so  slow,  so  careful,  so  conservative 
in    her    operations,    yet    never    stands    still.     The 

r  May-time  comes,  and  then  her  blooms,  hitherto  so 
carefully  shut  up  from  the  wintry  blast,  must  unclose 
and  dare  the  open.  In  humanity  as  a  whole, 


THE  BROADENING  OF  LIFE  213 

and  in  the  development  of  the  individual  mind  in 
particular,  a  point  is  at  length  reached  when  the 
simpler  form  has  to  blend  with  the  new  elements. 
Its  life  is  to  be  enriched  by  a  new  complexity. 
The  soul  discovers  in  itself  an  irresistible  instinct 
to  prove  all  things,  to  know  life  in  its  fulness,  in  its 
wholeness.  In  Professor  Royce's  phrase,  we  begin 
to  "  look  for  the  whole  of  ourselves."  Outside  the 
circle  of  the  creeds  life  spreads  before  us  in  its 
wonder  and  its  mystery,  and  we  say  with  Fra 
Lippo  Lippi : 

This  world's  no  blot  for  us, 
Nor  blank  ;  it  means  intensely  and  means  good ; 
To  find  its  meaning  is  my  meat  and  drink. 

It  is  when  we  have  reached  this  point  of  growth 
that  we  are  faced  with  a  question  which  may  be 
said  to  constitute  the  peculiar  problem  of  our  day. 
It  is  that  of  combining  the  wider  interest  with  the 
older  fervour.  We_  cannot  escape  this,  for  it  is 
part  of  the  inevitable  movement  of  things.^  A  press- 
ing form  of  this  difficulty  to-day,  which  we  touch 
here  both  for  its  own  sake  and  as  an  illustration 
of  the  general  theme,  is  the  question  of  the  Church 
in  relation  to  amusements.  If  we  correctly  appre- 
hend the  doctrine  that  has  here  been  set  forth,  there 
should  be  room  for  a  settlement  of  this  matter, 
without  the  bitterness  and  heartburning  which 
some  sections  of  the  Church  just  now  are  exhibiting. 

What  is  the  position  ?  Some  Christian  commu- 
nities are  for  extending  their  operations  overTnew 
areas  of  interest.  The  people,  they  find,  want 
relaxation  and  amusement — "  a  natural  want,"  they 


214        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

say  ;  "  why  should  we  not  help  to  provide  it  ? 
Why  should  provision  for  this  side  of  life  be  left 
entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  irreligious,  who  ex- 
ploit it  purely  for  their  own  gain,  not  scrupling  to 
pander  to  the  lowest  passions,  not  recking  of  the 
ruin  of  men  ?  slf  billiards  is  a  good  exercise, 
why  not  provide  a  billiard-table  ?  If  the  drama 
has  supplied  the  noblest  extant  literature  in  the 
world,  why  should  there  not  be  room  for  a  drama 
in  the  Christian  conception  of  life  ?  J 

To  all  which  comes  a  reply,  and  from  men  of 
whose  worth  and  absolute  sincerity  there  can  be  no 
question.  "  No,"  say  they;  "  this  thing  has  been 
tried  and  found  wanting.  To  tamper  with  these 
things  means  a  direct  loss  of  spirituality  to  the 
Church.  Your  cannot  have  your  billiard-tables 
and  the  Holy  Spirit.  You  must  choose  between 
one  and  the  other.  They  are  not  compatible." 

The  dilemma  here  stated  is  to-day  a  jberribly 
serious  one  to  many  earnest  souls.  But  if  we  have 
correctly  stated  the  doctrine  of  this  question  there 
should  be  no  difficulty  about  its  solution.  It  is  all 
a  matter  of  the  stage  of  development.  ^If  individuals 
or  if  Churches  are  at  the  level  where  the  new  com- 
plexity is  proved  harmful,  they  are  better  without 
it,  and  are  right  in  rejecting  it.  The  flowers  must 
not  appear  in  March  that  are  meant  for  May. 
Let  each  man,  each  community,  judge  of  their 
own  condition,  of  what  is  safe  for  their  highest 
interests,  and  act  accordingly.  With  the  conserva- 
tive attitude  here  we  have  all  sympathy,  realising 
with  Goethe  that  <  everything  which  frees  our 
spirit  without  giving  us  the  mastery  over  ourselves 


THE  BROADENING  OF  LIFE  215 

is '  pernicious."  Till  a  thing  can  be  safely  done 
it  were  better  not  done.  Not  the  less  certain  is  it, 
however,  that  in  the  spiritual  development  of 
humanity  the  point  will  be  reached  when  these 
diverse  elements  will  be  included.  They  will  be 
included  in  the  consciousness  of  the  spiritual 
man  because  they  are  included  in  the 
consciousness  of  God.  And  that  stage  has 
already  been  reached  by  many  souls.  ^^They 
have  learned  the  spiritual  life  as  at  once  an 
unfathomed  depth,  and  as  an  illimitable  breadth/ 
They  pass  from  one  phase  to  another  without  loss, 
but  with  a  conscious  enrichment.  And  the  point 
they  have  attained  will  be  attained  in  the  end  by 
all.  To  the  common  humanity  will  come  at  last 
the  experience  and  the  conviction  which  Browning 
has  expressed  for  us  : 

You've  seen  the  world, 

The  beauty  and  the  wonder  and  the  power, 
The  shapes  of  things,  their  colours,  lights  and  shades, 
Changes,  surprises — and  God  made  it  all ! 


XXIII 
Politics  and  Religion 

WHAT  is  the  true  relation  between  religion  and 
politics  ?  Is  religion  necessarily  political  ?  Or  is  it, 
in  the  highest  view,  non-political  ?  Or  can  it  be 
non-committal  ?  Or,  looking  from  the  other  side, 
can  politics,  with  any  consistency  or  success,  steer 
clear  of  the  religious  question  ?  Can  the  principles 
and  the  personalities  represented  by  the  two  sides 
run  on  parallel  lines  without  touching  ? 

These  questions,  be  it  noted,  stand  for  opinions 
which  have  been  actually  held.  There  are,  for 
instance,  excellent  people  in  England  who  would 
regard  an  interference  in  politics  as  compromising 
their  Christian  character.  "  Let  the  potsherds 
of  the  earth  strive  with  the  potsherds  of  the  earth  " 
was  the  reply  made  to  an  acquaintance  of  the 
writer  when  soliciting  the  vote  of  a  devout  religion- 
ist. And  it  is  curious  in  this  connection  to  note 
that  the  Anglican,  whose  Church  is  as  to  its  external 
position  an  essentially  political  institution,  which 
owes  its  status  to  an  Act  of  Parliament,  whose 
chief  officers  are  chosen  by  the  Government  and  sit 
in  the  Legislature,  is  of  all  others  the  person  to 
endorse  \n  certain  directions  the  exclusive  view  of 

216 


POLITICS  AND  RELIGION 

our  devotee .  Our  good  Churchman,  who  owes  every- 
thing to  politics,  cannot  endure  politics  in  his 
Dissenting  neighbour.  The  "  religious  Noncon- 
formist "  may  be  tolerated,  but  the  "  political 
Nonconformist  "  is  anathema.  There  are  other 
anomalies  both  of  opinion  and  of  feeling  on  this 
subject,  which  show  how  confused  is  the  issue  in 
the  general  mind,  and  how  important  it  is  we  should 
get  some  clear  thinking  and  some  plain  conclusions 
in  regard  to  it. 

As  a  start  towards  these  conclusions,  it  may 
be  well  to  glance  at  the  history  of  the  question.  In 
the  early  world  there  was  hardly  any  difference 
upon  it.  Everything  then  was  tribal,  and  the  new 
point  introduced  by  individualism  had  not  arisen. 
Politics  and  religion  were  one,  because  the  primitive 
politics  relied  always  upon  a  supernatural  sanction. 
The  early  Judaic  constitution,  as  the  Bible  shows 
us,  was  a  theocracy,  with  a  legislation  promulgated  as 
from  heaven.  But  Moses  was  not  the  only  law- 
giver who  appealed  in  this  way  to  the  unseen.  His 
method  was,  in  fact,  a  commonplace  amongst  the 
statesmen  of  his  time.  Thus,  we  have  the  Egyptians 
referring  their  code  to  the  God  Thoth  ;  Minos  in 
Crete  receives  his  from  Jupiter,  Lycurgus  in  Sparta 
is  inspired  by  Apollo,  Zoroaster  in  Persia  by 
Ahura  Mazda,  Numa  Pompilius  in  Rome  by  the 
nymph  Egeria.  .  And  as  with  the  laws  so  with  the 
other  forms  of  the  national  life.  Religion  was  a 
department  and  a  function  of  the  State.  Our 
question  as  to  politics  and  religion  was,  we  say,  not 
even  in  view. 

We  reach  it,  however,  and  in  its  acutest  phase, 


218         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

when  we  come  upon  the  history  and  the  principles 
of  Christianity.  Was  Jesus  a  politican  ?  In  one  sense, 
we  may  say  the  vulgar  sense,  assuredly  He  was 
not.  He  refuses  the  argument  of  force.  He 
knows  nothing  of  lobbying,  of  the  bribe,  of  "  the 
pull."  "  My  Kingdom  is  not  of  this  world,"  is 
one  of  His  most  decisive  sentences.  The  masterly 
reply  to  the  question  of  tribute  to  Caesar,  the  refusal 
to  head  a  popular  movement  when  the  opportunity 
offered,  as  well  as  the  whole  tenor  of  His  teaching, 
are  the  commentary  upon  that  utterance.  And 
yet,  with  reverence  be  it  said,  Jesus  was  the  politician 
of  His  time.  He  was  so  in  the  sense  in  which 
i  Socrates,  centuries  before,  declared  he  was  the  only 
politician  in  Athens,  and  that,  because  his  object 
was  to  improve  the  State  by  improving  the  souls  of 
the  citizens.  And  it  is  that  newer  sense  of  the 
human  solidarity,  by  which  we  realise  the  essential 
oneness  of  life,  the  intimate  and  inevitable  relation 
of  each  part  to  all  the  rest,  that  enables  us  to-day 
to  see  this  so  clearly.  Jesus,  the  eternal  type  of 
the  spiritual  man,  has  shown  us  for  all  time  that 
religion  is  in  the  high  sense  necessarily  political, 
and  for  the  reason  that,  as  a  reality,  it  permeates 
every  feature  and  aspect  both  of  the  individual 
and  the  communal  life.  Without  aiming  at  what 
are  called  political  results  it  achieves  these  on  the 
greatest  scale.  Thus  is  it  that  the  prophet  is 
always  a  founder  or  a  reformer  of  the  State. 

It  is  worth  remembering  here  that  this  was 
precisely  the  view  which  those  shrewd  worldlings, 
the  heads  of  the  Jewish  State,  took  of  Jesus  and  His 
work.  Whoever  else  failed  to  recognise  it,  they 


219 

saw,  with  the  clearness  of  self-interest,  the  political 
aspect  of  the  matter.  To  them  Christ  was  the 
most  dangerous  of  revolutionaries.  They  would 
have  accepted  Camille  Desmoulins'  definition  of 
Him  as  "  le  sansculotte  J^sus."  Annas  and  Caiaphas 
had  no  illusion  on  this  subject.  The  teaching  of  the 
Galilaean,  whatever  else  it  meant,  meant  political 
death  to  them.  It  was  an  indictment  of  their 
methods  which  blood  alone  could  avenge.  And 
so  they  crucified  Him. 

We  have  here,  then,  a  political  action  which  from 
beginning  to  end  was  purely  ethical  and  spiritual. 
But  it  would  be  easy  to  mistake  the  inference 
this  carries.  The  whole  of  Christianity  is  not 
contained  in  its  beginning.  The  first  believers,  the 
early  missionaries  of  the  Cross,  had  not  the  entire 
problem  before  them  as  their  successors  had.  It 
is  one  thing  to  start  a  new  spiritual  movement  in  a 
country,  leaving  the  whole  business  of  administra- 
tion to  its  existing  holders.  The  situation  is 
changed  when  the  movement  has  reached  the  top,  and 
is  felt  and  accepted  by  the  administrators  them- 
selves. In  the  one  case  you  can  be  entirely  spiritual ; 
you  are,  in  fact,  shut  up  to  that.  In  the  other  you 
have  not  the  souls  of  men  only,  but  the  whole 
national  and  communal  problem  before  you  ;  with 
the  question  :  "  How  is  the  new  religion  to  worls 
upon  that  ?  "  And  the  history  for  long  and  troubled 
centuries  is  one  of  experiment  after  experiment 
in  getting  this  question  answered. 

The  beginning  was  when  Constantine,  master  of 
the  Roman  world  in  315  A.D.,  made  Christianity 
the  religion  of  the  State.  The  faith  which  hitherto 


220         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

had  worked  from  the  bottom  upwards  was  now  to 
work  from  the  top  downwards.  Politics  were  to 
become  religious,  and  religion  political  in  a  new 
way — a  bad  way.  For  in  both  it  meant  the  employ- 
ment of  force  in  a  sphere  where  force  is  absurdly 
out  of  place.  Emperors,  by  their  civil  authority, 
dictated  to  Church  Councils  what  was  to  be  pro- 
claimed as  the  true  belief.  As  though  the  mind's 
belief  can  be  compelled  by  anything  that  is  not 
mental !  Augustine,  following  in  this  vicious  track, 
found  in  the  Scriptural  admonition  "  compel  them 
to  come  in  "  an  argument  for  persecution  as  an  aid 
to  conversion.  For  ages  kings  and  priests  were 
allied  in  this  conception  of  things.  They  both 
believed  in  force  as  the  supreme  religious  agent ; 
their  only  quarrel,  and  it  was  a  fierce  one,  was  as 
to  which  should  wield  it.  Charlemagne,  when  he 
conquered  the  Saxons,  offered  them  the  choice  of 
baptism  or  the  sword,  and  made  them  believers 
on  those  terms.  But  he  dictated  to  the  clergy, 
from  the  Pope  downwards,  as  to  their  position 
and  duties.  On  the  other  hand,  as  early  as  the 
fifth  century,  we  have  Pope  Gelasius  declaring 
the  spiritual  power  superior  to  kings  ;  a  doctrine 
which  Hildebrand  and  Innocent  III.  at  a  later 
day  carried  to  so  supreme  a  height. 

Early  Protestantism  had  no  clearer  ideas  on  this 
subject  than  its  rival.  The  Protestant  Churches 
were,  for  the  main  part,  frankly  political.  Lecky 
does  not  scruple  to  say  that  Anglicanism  was 
"  created  in  the  first  instance  by  a  Court  intrigue." 
Zwingli's  ideas  of  a  Christian  State  were  avowedly 
Erastian.  Calvin  gave  Geneva  a  constitution  in 


POLITICS  AND^RELIGION  221 

which  the  spirituality  ruled  by  political  force.  He 
had  no  scruples  about  persecution.  He  exhorted 
the  Protector  Somerset  in  England  "  to  punish 
well  by  the  sword  heretics  and  fanatic  gospellers." 
Knox  fought  for  a  similar  system  in  Scotland, 
and  advocated  the  execution  of  Gardiner  and  other 
Romanists.  Lutheranism  had  the  same  story.  The 
religious  peace  of  Augsberg  in  1555,  with  its  principle 
of  "  Cujus  regio,  ejus  religio,"  in  which  Protestantism 
received  from  Charles  V.  a  legal  status,  made  a 
man's  religion  an  affair  of  the  country  he  lived  in. 
The  careful  student  of  history  has,  in  fact,  to 
admit  that  the  Reformation  in  England  and  Scot- 
land and,  on  the  Continent,  in  Denmark,  Sweden 
and  Norway,  and  some  of  the  German  States, 
in  so  far  as  it  was  carried  into  effect  by  the  govern- 
ing classes,  was  on  their  part  more  a  scheme  of 
plunder,  of  appropriation  of  the  Church  lands,  than 
a  religious  movement. 

This  view  of  the  relation  of  religion  to  politics, 
the  view,  that  is,  of  making  religion  a  department  of 
the  State,  has  in  all  the  modern  countries  where 
it  has  been  tried  produced  two  curious  results. 
One  is  the  creation  amongst  the  educated  classes 
of  a  philosophic  indifferentism,  such  as  that  of 
Montaigne  in  France,  and  Shaftesbury  and  Lord 
Melbourne  in  England,  a  view  which  regards  religion 
as  merely  a  useful  instrument  of  government, 
and,  on  the  other  hand,  of  a  Nonconformity  which 
has  been  always  a  reaction  from  the  State  formalism 
towards  a  deeper  and  more  genuine  spiritual  life. 
Nonconformity  seems  in  religion  the  Hegelian 
opposite  which  is  necessary  to  complete  its  idea. 


222      ;  RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Protestantism  was  the  Nonconformity  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  a  Nonconformity  which,  be  it  re- 
membered, produced  not  simply  the  moral  reform- 
ation of  the  Protestant  States,  but  the  vast  counter- 
Reformation  in  the  Roman  Church  which  transformed 
and  renewed  it.  The  Nonconformity  of  England 
has  had  the  same  twofold  result.  Not  only  has  its 
influence  been  felt  as  an  incalculable  moral  force 
among  the  classes  it  has  directly  influenced,  but  it 
has  acted  with  a  scarcely  less  intensity  upon  the 
Establishment  to  which  it  is  a  rival.  Some 
of  the  best  influences  at  work  to-day  in  Angli- 
canism, as  well  as  some  of  its  most  potent 
personalities,  are  easily  traceable  to  Nonconformist 
sources. 

We  have  not  yet  reached  the  final  solution  of 
the  problem  of  religion  and  politics.  The  best 
minds  are  clear  about  the  negative  issues.  They 
see  that  in  the  sphere  of  conviction  force  is  no 
remedy.  To  apply  force  to  compel  belief  is  not 
only  cruel,  it  is  ridiculous.  Force  may  produce 
fear,  may  compel  submission,  but  never  belief, 
which  is  an  affair  purely  of  the  mind's  answer  to 
evidence.  But  the  positive  side  of  this  relation  is, 
we  say,  still  in  a  formative  stage,  and  that  because 
our  notion  both  of  religion  and  politics  is  also 
in  that  stage.  What  we  are  reaching  towards  is  a 
position  in  which  all  politics  will  be  religion.  But  in 
a  new  sense.  For  in  this  later,  and,  we  may  say,  final 
view,  politics  will  be  regarded  as  the  form  in  which 
the  common  human  life  is  to  express  itself  ;  while 
religion  will  be  accepted  as  the  inner  spiritual 
force  by  which  that  life  is  developed,  purified,  and 


POLITICS  AND  RELIGION  223 

lifted  to  its  highest  term.  But  these  two  things 
are  one — one  as  inner  and  outer,  as  the  convex 
and  concave  of  a  circle,  as  the  body  and  soul 
which  make  the  one  personality.  In  this  sense, 
to  be  truly  religious  is  to  be  truly  political,  and  to 
be  truly  political  is  to  be  truly  religious. 


XXIV 
A    Study  of    Backgrounds 

IN  the  summer,  months  English  people,  on  travel 
bent,  often  leave  their  home  scenery  in  search  of 
backgrounds.  For  foregrounds  and  middle  dis- 
tances our  own  island  is  incomparable.  From  end 
to  end  it  is  a  dream  of  pastoral  beauty.  Its  land- 
scapes are  such  as  a  Cuyp,  a  Claude  Lorraine 
dreamed  in  their  most  inspired  hours.  But  the 
view  has  nowhere  the  gigantic  backing  of  Alp 
or  Apennine.  There  are  effects  which  the  snow 
mountains  alone  can  offer.  If  any  one  wants  their 
spiritual  interpretation  let  him  read  or  reread  the 
first  volume  of  "  The  Stones  of  Venice."  Yes,  the 
Alps  for  background.  We  shall  ourselves  not 
easily  forget  one  moment  when,  on  a  hot  summer 
day,  toiling  up  the  St.  Nicholas  valley — it  was  before 
Zermatt  knew  its  railway — we  turned  a  sharp 
corner,  and  had  for  the  first  time  our  vision  filled 
by  the  gigantic  Matterhorn,  "  the  cock  that  crows 
over  Europe,"  to  use  Michelet's  term,  its  solid  rock- 
mass  cleaving  the  very  heavens. 

But  there  are  other  backgrounds  than  those 
of  Alpine  scenery,  the  study  of  which,  we  perceive, 
may  carry  us  much  further  than  Zermatt  or  the 

224 


A  STUDY  OF  BACKGROUNDS         225 

Matterhorn.  It  is  startling  to  note  how  the  great ) 
human  interests,  life's  raptures  and  despairs,  its/ 
problems  and  mysteries,  its  charms,  fascinations^ 
retributions,  are  all  matters  of  background.  \  Every- 
where the  story  is  of  the  thing  in  front  of  us,  and 
the  thing  behind  it.  It  is,  indeed,  hi  the  perpetual 
comparison  and  contrast  between  these  two  that 
we  pass  our  existence  ;  that,  in  fact,  we  have  our 
existence,  and  know  ourselves  alive.  Our  world- 
consciousness  is  a  consciousness  of  opposites.  We 
could  not  imagine  a  "  self  "  apart  from  a  "  not  self," 
an  upper  apart  from  an  under,  this  colour  apart  from 
those  different  ones.  Our  notion  of  good  relies 
on  a  background  of  not  good.  There  could  be  no 
sense  of  superiority  did  not  the  world  oblige  us 
with  the  indispensable  inferior. 

We  note,  also,  how  the  interest  of  life  is  in  pro- 
portion to  the  sharp  collision  and  contrast  of  these 
opposites.  In  a  Beethoven  sonata  we  have  the 
climax  of  effect  when,  from  the  crashing  thunders 
beneath,  some  celestial  melody  leaps  out  and  sings 
itself  in  the  clear  heavens.  All  the  arts,  indeed, 
are  constructed  upon  this  law.  There  are  painters 
who  have  lived  on  contrasts.  A  typical  Rem- 
brandt is,  in  its  colour  effect,  like  a  flash  upon  a 
thundercloud.  Millais,  in  his  "  Princes  in  the 
Tower,"  makes  the  whole  picture,  with  its  shadowy 
forms  and  outlines,  into  a  background  for  those  few 
inches  of  illuminated  space  in  the  centre  where  the 
pale  faces  of  the  doomed  lads  look  out  upon  us  with 
such  pathetic,  tragic  intensity.  The  great  orators 
build  also  on  this  foundation.  A  born  speaker 
will  not  strive  all  the  time  for  brilliancy.  He  knows 

15 


226         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

the  human  heart  better.  He  can  afford  to  be  dry 
on  occasion  ;  to  quietly  accumulate  his  facts,  to 
plod  through  his  argument.  The  experienced  lis- 
tener knows  what  is  afoot.  The  artist  is  here 
preparing  his  background,  out  of  which,  in  vivid 
and  magnificent  contrast,  will  by-and-by  leap  the 
lightnings. 

Nature,  we  have  said,  produces  her  main  effects 
this  way.  She  works  by  contrast.  \Some  of  our 
most  exquisite  joys  are  struck  straight  out  of  pain.  ' 
So  much  is  this  so  that,  built  as  we  now  are,  a 
world  of  perpetual  comfort  and  luxury  would  be 
one  deprived  of  half  its  zest.  The  joy  of  a  holiday 
is  one-half  background — the  reaction  from  hard 
work  and  fatigue.  The  fresh  air  of  the  mountain 
is  doubly  sweet  because  of  the  taste  of  city  smoke 
which  lingers  with  us.  And  thus  the  mere  idler 
never  has  a  holiday.  The  essential  ingredients  are 
wanting.  "  I  pity  you,"  wrote  Lamb  to  his  friend 
Bernard  Barton,  "  for  overwork  ;  but  I  assure  you  no 
work  is  worse.  The  mind  preys  on  itself,  the  most 
unwholesome  food."  And  what  would  life  be 
without  its  background  of  danger  and  hardship  ? 
All  the  good  stories  are  of  pain  and  difficulty  vic- 
toriously won  through.  .Perhaps  the  most  delicious  of 
all  sensations  are  those  of  escapes,  of  deliverances. 
When  a  poor  man  becomes  prosperous  he  tastes 
a  sensation  which  the  languid  air  of  riches  cannot 
purchase.  Have  our  readers  ever  known  what  it 
is  to  reach  port  after  wildest  tossing  and  expected 
shipwreck  ?  There  are  certain  sensations  which  have 
to  be  earned.  There  is  no  broad  road  to  them.  The 
way  is  through  a  strait  gate  of  peril  and  endurance. 


A  STUDY  OF  BACKGROUNDS          227 

It  is  by  a  curious  and  terrible  perversion  of  the 
human  mind  that  this  law  of  contrast,  of  the  back- 
ground, has  been  used  "io  obtain  pleasure  by  the 
spectacle   of  others'  suffering  and  misfortune^  It 
is  to  us  difficult  to  conceive  that  men  in  any  stage 
of   civilisation    should    find    their    enjoyment    en- 
hanced  by   a   background  of   misery.     tBut   man, 
through  whole  periods  of  his  history,  has  exhibited 
this  instinct.    The   Roman  triumph  required  the  ( 
manacled,  humiliated  captives  in  the  conqueror's 
train.    The  feudal  chief  derived  gratification  from 
the    thought    that     beneath    the     banqueting-hall 
where    he    feasted    were    dungeons    and    torture- 
chambers  in  which  his  prisoners   languished  and 
suffered.    Men,  Christian  men,  carried  this  savagery    . 
into   theology   and  made   heaven  into   a  kind   of 
feudal  castle,   with  its   arrangement  of  cells  and 
oubliettes  beneath.     Thomas   Aquinas   writes   with 
entire  complacency  that  "  the  blessed  in  heaven 
will  behold  the  tortures  of  the  damned,  that  their 
own  beatitude  may  thereby  be  increased."    And 
what  a  passage  is  that  in  which  Tertullian,  in  the 
"  De  Spectaculis,"  allows  his  fiery  Punic  blood  to 
exult  over  the  coming  fate,  in  hell,  of  the  pagan 
world  !     "  What   theme    excites   my   admiration  ? 
What  my  derision  ?    Which  sight  gives  me  joy  ? 
.     .     .    I  shall  have  a  better  opportunity  then  of 
hearing  the  tragedians,  louder  voiced  in  their  own 
calamity  ;  of  viewing  the  play-actors,  much  more 
*  dissolute  '  in  the  dissolving  flame  ;  of  looking  upon 
the  charioteer  all  glowing  in  his  chariot  of  fire  ; 
of  witnessing  the  wrestlers,  not  in  their  gymnasia, 
but  tossing  in  the  fiery  billows."    This,  of  course, 


228         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

is  not  Christianity,  but  African  savagery.  One 
might,  in  fact,  study  Christian  theology,  in  its 
progress  through  the  ages,  simply  to  note  its  separate 
stages,  the  struggle  of  the  original  brute  nature 
in  the  theologian,  with  the  actual  mind  of  Christ. 

Another  curious  form  of  mental  background 
reveals  itself  in  the  history  of  certain  movements. 
One  notes,  for  instance,  how  the  success  of  a  reli- 
gious leader  and  his  cause  depends  not  merely  on 
the  qualities  of  the  leader,  or  on  the  goodness  of  his 
work,  but  to  an  equal  degree  apparently  on  a  certain 
background  of  circumstance.  The  odd  thing  is 
that  these  circumstances  are  continually  being 
deprecated  by  the  worker  as  the  very  evil  against 
which  he  is  striving.  The  mission  of  a  Luther,  of  a 
Wesley,  obtains  its  immense  vogue  from  the  lack 
of  anything  similar  at  the  time.  The  previous 
absence  of  what  they  bring  is  the  hunger  which 
gives  savour  to  the  meal  they  supply.  Were  the 
thing  they  brought  already  there,  our  reformers 
had  been  superfluous  and  their  career  a  fiasco. 
A  famous  Congregationalist  preacher  of  the  last 
generation,  John  Graham  of  Sydney,  tells  the 
story  of  a  religious  meeting  he  held  in  the  bush. 
Notice  had  been  given  of  it,  and  the  hardy  diggers 
and  shepherds  had  flocked  to  the  rendezvous  from 
far  and  wide.  Numbers  of  them  had  not  been  at  a 
service  for  years.  The  preacher,  who  knew  how 
to  put  the  great  truths  in  homeliest  fashion,  was 
enormously  successful,  and  one  can  see  why.  He 
was  playing  upon  a  great  hunger.  All  the  memories 
of  childhood,  all  the  unsatisfied  aspirations  of 
solitary  after-years,  all  the  deep  undercurrents  of 


A  STUDY  OF  BACKGROUNDS          229 

religious  feeling  rose  in  the  rough  bosoms  of  the 
listeners,  and  flowed  into  one  mighty  stream  of 
passionate  emotion.  They  would  not  let  the 
preacher  stop,  and  the  meeting  went  on  till  near 
midnight.  Would  it  have  been  thus  with  an 
audience  full  fed  with  regular  ministration  ?  The 
singular  reflection  is  forced  upon  us  that  the  very 
want  and  spiritual  indigence  with  the  evangelist  is 
so  accustomed  to  deplore  is  in  reality  his  own  best 
ally.  It  is  the  indispensable  background  of  his 
work. 

In  these  instances  the  background  is,  we  see, 
in  a  lack,  an  emptiness,  a  hunger.  More  often, 
however,  it  is  something  positive.  Philosophers 
have  speculated  somewhat  cynically  on  the  physical 
concomitants  of  moral  actions.  Burke,  for  in- 
stance, argues  that  a  time  of  general  mortality 
induces  a  special  outburst  of  wickedness.  "  It 
was  so  in  the  great  plague  of  Athens.  It  was  so  in 
the  plague  of  London  in  1 665.  It  appears  in  soldiers, 
sailors,  &c.  Whoever  would  contrive  to  render 
the  life  of  man  much  shorter  than  it  is,  would, 
I  am  satisfied,  find  the  surest  recipe  for  increasing 
the  wickedness  of  our  nature."  Renan  has  the 
same  idea  in  his  "  Abbesse  de  Jouarre."  In  another 
direction  Taine  has  argued  for  climate  as  at  the 
back  of  our  insular  morality.  "  It  was  impossible 
for  the  Saxons  to  go  in  for  pleasure  in  their  detest- 
able climate,  and  so  they  went  in  for  morality, 
which  they  are  likely  to  get  in  that  kind  of  atmo- 
sphere." We  accept  none  of  these  data.  They  are  a 
philosophy  pour  rire.  Not  the  less  does  it  remain 
that  at  the  back  of  men's  actions,  at  the  back  of 


230         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

their  characters,  lie  incalculable  elements,  un- 
reckoned  by  their  fellows,  unknown  even  to  them- 
selves, but  which  work  on  them  with  irresistible 
power,  and  the  remembrance  of  which  should 
make  us  chary  indeed  of  judgment. 

The  background  of  men's  doings,  we  say,  is, 
for  one  thing,  the  universe  ;  and  until  we  have 
reached  its  inner  secret  we  are  in  no  condition 
for  oracular  pronouncement  about  them.  But 
there  is  another  background — ourselves.  The 
quality  of  my  work  to-day  is  an  affair  of 
all_niy  yesterdays.  And  it  is  not  only  the 
quality,  it  is  also  the  present  effect  of  our 
work  that  rests  on  this  background.  When  a  man 
seeks  to  influence  his  fellows,  it  is  his  past  that 
empowers  or  nullifies  his  word.  "  What  you  are," 
says  Emerson,  "  stands  over  you  and  thunders 
go  that  I  cannot  hear  what  you  say  to  the  contrary." 
Goodness,  urges  Quintillian,  is  the  first  qualifica- 
tion of  the  orator.  It  assuredly  is  of  the  Christian 
orator.  Ophelia  gives  us  the  secret  of  innumerable 
pulpit  failures : 

Do  not,  as  some  ungracious  pastors  do, 
Show  me  the  steep  and  thorny  way  to  heaven, 
Whilst  like  a  puffd  and  reckless  libertine, 
Himself  the  primrose  path  of  dalliance  treads 
And  recks  not  his  own  rede. 

Man,  it  seems,  cannot  in  any  direction  get  on 
without  his  background.  He  must  lean  upon  a 
power  behind  him.  His  own  past,  if  it  has  been  re- 
putable, is  a  constant  and  invaluable  reinforcement. 
But  it  is  not  enough.  The  great  issues  demand 
more  from  us  than  either  our  past  or  present  can 


A  STUDY  OF  BACKGROUNDS          231 

furnish.  The  heroes  have  always  known  this. 
William  the  Silent,  when  told  his  cause  was  hope- 
less, replied  :  "  When  I  took  in  hand  to  defend 
these  oppressed  Christians,  I  made  an  alliance  with 
the  mightiest  of  all  Potentates — the  God  of  Hosts — 
who  is  able  to  save  us  if  He  choose."  There  is, 
indeed,  no  background  like  that.  When  a  man 
has  his  back  against  this  wall  of  defence,  he  is  not 
to  be  put  down. 

We  began  by  depreciating  the  English  back- 
ground. But  often,  as  we  have  looked  at  it,  we 
have  felt  that  the  slight  is  undeserved.  For  beyond 
the  horizon  line  have  we  not  at  all  times  the  in- 
finite sky,  and  what  background  is  comparable  to 
that  ?  And  human  life,  when  we  lift  our  eyes  from  its 
pettinesses,  has  ever  the  sublimest  of  backgrounds. 
When  we  look  up  we  must  cease  to  be  trivial. 
Dr.  Johnson  had  engraved  on  his  watch  the  motto 
Nu£  yap  epxerai — "  For  the  night  cometh."  It  is 
the  thought  that  lies  at  the  bottom  of  every  serious 
mind.  For  such  the  scene  is  the  symbol  of  a  vaster 
unseen  ;  and  time  but  the  foreground  of  eternity. 


XXV 
Concerning    Births 

MAN,  poet  and  mystic  that  he  is,  in  all  his  literatures 
has  spoken  of  the  new  year  as  a  birth.  He  will 
persist  in  projecting  the  mystery  of  his  own  life 
upon  the  outside  world,  and  in  associating  its 
fortunes  with  his  own.  Thus,  the  year,  prosaic 
enough  as  a  mere  annual  swing  of  the  planet  round 
the  sun,  is  figured  by  him  as  at  the  beginning  an 
infant  of  days,  passing  thence  to  its  youth  of  spring, 
its  lusty  vigour  of  the  summer,  its  decline  in  autumn, 
its  old  age  and  death  in  winter.  And  in  thus 
associating  himself  with  his  world,  endowing  it 
with  his  own  fates,  man  follows  a  true  instinct. 
For  the  world,  too,  is  alive  with  his  own  life.  The 
last  word  of  the  old  Hindoo  philosophy,  "  Thou  art 
that,"  had  reality  in  it.  What  travellers  are  we 
and  our  world  through  time  and  space  !  We  belong 
both  of  us  to  infinity  and  eternity.  How  busy 
our  universe  is  !  What  traffic  through  its  boun- 
daries !  Not  only  are  we  spinning  round  the  sun, 
but  tlje_  solar  motion  of  which  we  partake  has  carried 
those  of  us  who  are  fifty  years  old  some  two  thou- 
sand millions  of  miles  from  the  spot  where  we  first 
saw  the  light.  But  let  us  get  to  our  question  of 


CONCERNING  BIRTHS  233 

births.  The  first  of  all  births,  the  birth  of  the 
universe,  was  the  first  miracle  and  the  greatest. 
Science  to-day  is  puzzling  over  the  absolute  con- 
tradiction of  an  endless  variety  arising  out  of  what, 
according  to  its  own  hypothesis,  must  at  the  begin- 
ning have  been  a  perfectly  homogeneous  substance. 
Here  indeed  was  a  begetting  before  the  worlds. 

Not  less  wondrous  is  the  thought  of  our  own 
birth,  our  coming  to  be  what  we  are  on  this  planet. 
Think  of  the  chain  of  births  by  which  we  hang  ! 
Here  are  we  in  the  twentieth  century,  but  for  the 
other  end  of  the  chain  we  grope  through  countless 
millienniums  of  dim,  warring  populations  without 
a  history,  until  we  are  back  at  that  Pithecanthropus 
or  erect  man-ape  found  in  the  Pliocene,  probably 
a  quarter  of  a  million  years  old  ;  and  still  on  to  the 
man-like  apes  of  the  Miocene  period  another  half- 
million  years  further  back !  We  safeguard  our  births 
to-day  with  all  manner  of  moralities,  but  our  life's 
continuity  was  maintained  through  vast  periods 
which  knew  no  morality  save  Nature's.  We  are 
here  to-day,  with  all  we  have  and  hope  for,  because 
these  myriad  savage  generations,  without  a  single 
failure,  amid  all  the  gusty  blasts  of  that  early  world, 
kept  aloft  the  torch  of  life  and  handed  its  mystic 
flame,  brightly  burning,  to  their  successors. 

Birth  is  the  greatest  thing  in  the  world.  Here 
is  a  force  for  change,  for  movement,  against  which 
no  human  thought-structure,  however  venerable, 
however  authoritative,  can  hold  out.  A  new 
universe,  says  Richter,  is  created  every  time  a 
child  is  born.  That  is  a  double-sided  truth.  Our 
universe  comes  with  us.  So  far  as  we  are  concerned 


234         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

it  began  when  we  did.  But  the  truth  here  is  not 
only  one  of  perception.  It  is  one  also  of  creation. 
The  new-comer  never  leaves  the  world  as  he  found 
it.  Here  is  the  power  that  makes  all  new.  The 
babe  is  the  oldest,  the  most  authoritative  of  us  all. 
It  brings  the  latest  news  of  the  world's  secret.  It 
is  to  start  where  we  leave  off,  and  we  are  at  its 
mercy.  A  hoary  theology  may  have  uttered  its 
last  word ;  have  published  decrees  backed  with 
ecclesiastical  thunders  and  the  authority  of  a 
thousand  years.  It  breathes  the  word  infallibility. 
Roma  locuta  est ;  res  finita  est.  In  vain.  The 
scheme  might  answer  if  the  same  men  lived  on  for 
ever.  But  it  is  birth  that  kills  these  pretensions. 
There  comes  into  this  sphere  a  fresh  mind  and  soul, 
a  fresh  generation  of  souls,  that  finds  in  itself  a 
sense,  a  perception  of  things,  that  nothing  of  the 
old  system  answers  to  ;  these  souls  have,  in  fact, 
brought  with  them  a  new  atmosphere,  through 
which  they  read  history  and  the  universe  in  their 
own  manner.  And  so  the  infallibilities  go,  or 
reconstruct  themselves.  Birth  is  thus  the  pledge 
of  eternal  movement,  of  an  endless  inner  progression. 
Nothing  is  more  ludicrous,  ore  might  say  indecent, 
than  the  jealousy  of  the  old  against  the  young. 
Utterly  useless  are  these  exclamations  of  our 
venerables  at  the  audacity  of  their  successors.  It 
is  they,  if  they  only  saw  it,  who  are  the  pre- 
sumptuous, for  their  anger  is  a  revolt  against  the 
universal  order  ;  it  is  a  proclamation  that  their  worn- 
out  mind,  and  not  that  of  the  Eternal  from  whom 
all  the  generations  come,  should  speak  the  final 
word. 


CONCERNING  BIRTHS  235 

Nothing  is  more  mysterious  than  birth.  For 
ages  philosophers  have  been  trying  to  construct 
a  science  and  an  art  of  it ;  they  have  speculated 
on  the  true  eugenic  laws  and  sought  to  elaborate 
them  into  State  enactments.  Plato's  ideal  Re- 
public is  made  to  rest  for  its  prosperity  on  a  proper 
regulation  of  births.  The  idea  is  that  as  we  can 
so  enormously  modify  and  improve  animal  races 
by  such  means,  so  the  true  human  progress  must 
be  along  this  road.  And  that  there  is  a  vast  truth 
here  to  be  explored  and  applied  is  becoming  in- 
creasingly clear  to  thoughtful  minds.  All  that 
relates  to  birth  needs  to  be  investigated  with  the 
exactitude  of  modern  science,  for  it  is  in  this  realm, 
as  hi  no  other,  that  are  hid  the  secrets  of  human 
well-being.  And  yet  how  baffling  are  the  facts  ! 
We  talk  of  heredity,  but  how  few  great  fathers 
have  had  great  sons  !  How  often,  on  the  contrary, 
is  the  son  a  mocker  of  the  father's  character! 
Marcus  Aurelius  is  succeeded  by  a  Commodus  ; 
at  the  dawn  of  the  Middle  Ages  Clovis  in  the  West 
and  Heraclitus  in  the  East,  doughty  warriors  them- 
selves, are  each  followed  by  a  long  line  of  incom- 
petents ;  Cromwell  is  succeeded  by  the  weakling 
Richard. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  men  of  supreme  vigour 
and  capacity  spring  from  the  strangest  origins. 
Justinian  was  the  child  of  a  Slavonian  peasant. 
Luther  said  of  himself,  "  I  am  a  peasant's  son  ;  my 
father,  grandfather  and  ancestors  were  peasants." 
D'Alembert  was  an  enfant  trouve  exposed  on  a  door- 
step. Indeed,  one  might  go  on  without  end  with 
examples.  When  we  have  made  all  our  investiga- 


236         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

tions  we  are  as  far  as  ever  from  answering  the  ques- 
tion, "  What  is  the  origin  of  genius  ?  "  To  investi- 
gate family  history  here  is  to  bewilder  rather  than 
to  inform.  We  find  four  or  five  children  born  of 
the  same  father  and  mother,  brought  up  under 
the  same  roof,  with  the  same  environment,  with  the 
same  teaching.  The  parents  are  nothing  in  par- 
ticular. What  was  there  in  Shakespeare's  parents, 
or  Bunyan's  ?  The  other  children  are  nothing  in 
particular.  Whence,  then,  has  this  one  of  them, 
who  fills  the  world  with  his  name,  derived  his  gifts  ? 
It  would  seem  as  though  the  heredity  here,  if  there  be 
any  at  all,  were  linked  to  another  sphere  and  system 
of  things,  than  to  a  physical  and  earthly  succession. 
Assuredly,  the  question  of  noble  birth  is  not 
settled  by  a  reference  to  Debrett.  As  Schiller  puts 
it :  "  The  question  is  not '  art  thou  in  the  nobility  ?  ' 
but,  '  is  there  nobility  in  thee  ?  '  If  it  comes 
to  a  comparison  of  social  stations,  a  man  of  ability 
and  character  may,  on  the  whole,  congratulate 
himself  if  he  begins  low  down.  There  is  so  much 
more  to  conquer  ;  so  vastly  interesting  an  ascent, 
and  such  invaluable  lessons  and  treasures  to  be 
picked  up  on  the  road.  Mr.  Carnegie,  who  knows 
by  experience  both  poverty  and  wealth,  said  recently, 
after  speaking  of  millionaire's  sons,  of  whom  he 
seems  to  have  a  very  poor  opinion,  that  "  the  young 
man  who  has  poverty  for  a  starting-point,  has  a 
vastly  better  chance  of  a  wholesome  and  happy 
life."  The  "  accident  of  birth,"  a  phrase  so  often 
used  of  our  titular  aristocracy,  is  apt  to  be  followed 
by  so  many  other  "  accidents  "  which  are  not 
happy  ones. 


CONCERNING  BIRTHS  237 

Nature  has  a  wider  birth-system  than  that  of 
the  individual.  She  has  her  birthdays  of  nations, 
of  institutions,  of  religions.  It  is  wonderful  to 
watch  here  her  labour  and  her  bringing  forth.  The 
law  on  this  larger  field  is,  we  find,  the  same  as  with 
the  individual.  The  newly  born  takes  the  material 
of  its  system  from  what  it  finds  already  there, 
but  always  adds  something  of  its  own.  When  the 
Western  Empire  fell  finally  in  476  under  the  stroke 
of  Odoacer  there  was  a  travail  of  three  turbulent 
centuries  before  the  new  order  of  the  European 
kingdoms  rose  to  a  coherent  individuality  and  life. 
This  new  was  full  of  the  old,  but  all  transformed 
and  made  over  again.  Imperial  Rome  had  passed 
away,  but  in  these  fresh  lusty  nations  its  laws,  its 
language,  its  institutions  found  a  subtle  renewal. 
Thus  does  the  past  eternally  partner  itself  with 
the  future  ;  thus,  through  all  her  mighty  schemes, 
does  Nature  hint  her  resurrection  secret,  whispering 
in  our  ear  that  death  is  never  final. 

A  strange  feature  in  this  larger  birth-history  is 
that  of  the  seeming  false  births  that  century  after 
century  have  mocked  human  hopes.  Man  has 
continually  imagined  his  Paradise  to  be  nearer 
than  it  was.  His  eye  travels  so  much  farther 
and  faster  than  his  feet.  His  City  of  God  gleams 
before  him  in  vision,  ready  to  be  entered  on  at  once  ; 
he  grasps  his  staff  for  the  forward  move,  to  find  the 
splendour  vanished.  How  pathetic,  in  the  light 
of  the  world's  after-history,  those  exultant  lines  of 
Lucan  in  his  "  Pharsalia,"  in  which  he  predicts  the 
reign  of  universal  peace  and  brotherly  love  !  How 
fair  seemed  the  prospect  for  religious  liberty,  when 


238          RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCED 

Henry  IV.  of  France,  with  Bodin  and  Pasquier  as 
his  literary  backers,  proclaimed  toleration  as  the 
only  policy  for  Church  and  State,  and  offered  the 
Edict  of  Nantes  as  his  pledge  of  sincerity  !  What 
visions  of  the  perfect  social  State  have  floated  before 
the  eyes  of  men  from  Plato  to  Charles  Fourier  ! 
The  history  since  seems  so  disappointing,  and  yet 
these  prophets  were  neither  deceivers  nor  deceived. 
They  were  simply  before  the  time.  The  perfect  State, 
the  perfect  Church,  the  perfect  brotherhood  are 
not  yet.  'Their  gestation  is  long  because  their 
quality  is  so  high'.  But  the  world  will  see  them  in 
then*  time.  §  . 

There  is  a  yet  higher  birth  than  any  we  have  so 
far  spoken  of.  It  is  that  given  us  in  the  words  of 
the  Fourth  Gospel :  "  That  which  is  born  of  the 
flesh  is  flesh,  and  that  which  is  born  of  the  spirit 
is  spirit."  In  his  highest  realm  man  finds  a  birth 
system,  less  clearly  marked,  perhaps,  than  lower 
down,  but  with  evidence  enough  of  its  reality.  The 
doctrine  of  the  physicist,  that  life  comes  only  from 
life,  has  here  also  a  perfect  confirmation.  Paul,  in 
that  great  rencontre  on  the  way  to  Damascus ; 
Augustine,  hearing  the  "  tolle,  lege  "  in  the  Milan 
garden ;  Wesley,  at  the  Aldersgate  meeting  in 
1738,  "  finding  his  heart  strangely  warmed,"  with 
all  that  followed  in  their  lives,  are  witnesses,  standing 
amidst  countless  similar  ones,  to  a  fact  of  the 
higher  psychology,  without  which  human  history 
can  never  be  explained.  The  "  new  birth,"  as 
these  and  others  have  experienced  it,  is  the  fruit 
of  an  alliance  between  man  and  the  "  something 
more,"  as  Professor  James  puts  it,  which  he  finds 


CONCERNING  BIRTHS  239 

in  his  universe.  It  is  the  conscious  union  of  the 
individual  with  that  greater  Self  which  is  the  spiritual 
ground  of  humanity,  that  "  Eternal  Word "  of 
whom,  as  Justin  Martyr  puts  it,  "  every  race  of 
man  are  partakers."  And  it  is  this  mystic  Divine 
fellowship,  this  birth  from  above,  which,  in  its  turn, 
gives  us  the  assurance  of  yet  another  birth  in  our 
life  story  ;  when  the  materials  we  have  gathered  in 
our  earthly  career,  dissolved  by  death,  shall  re- 
emerge  to  a  higher  form  and  a  diviner  service  in 
the  realm  beyond. 


XXVI 
Public  Meeting  Religion 

THE  question  may  be  asked  whether  the  public 
meeting,  as  an  organ  of  expression  and  as  a  power 
in  affairs,  is  not,  amongst  the  cultivated  classes 
at  least,  losing  its  hold.  Men  begin  to  realise 
more  acutely  than  beforetime  the  disabilities  of 
the  thing.  In  a  meeting  they  are  so  much  less 
free  than  at  their  club  or  their  fireside.  They  cannot 
smoke ;  they  cannot  talk ;  they  cannot  move 
about.  The  man  on  the  platform  is  probably  a 
bore,  and  they  are  unable  to  extinguish  him.  They 
cannot  throw  him  away  as  they  do  their  newspaper 
when  they  have  had  enough.  They  must  listen 
as  long  as  he  speaks.  And  the  average  speaker, 
even  if  not  a  bore,  has  probably  less  of  value 
to  say  on  his  subject  than  the  book  we  can  pick 
up  and  lay  down  at  our  will.  There  is  a  constant 
growth  in  the  modern  mind  of  the  sense  of  inde- 
pendence, and  more  and  more  men  prefer  to  get 
their  information  in  the  way  that  least  interferes 
with  it. 

The  public  meeting  will,  however,  last  our  time 
and  that  of  many  a  generation  to  come.  It  has 
had  much  to  do  with  the  making  of  history,  and 

240 


PUBLIC  MEETING  HELlGIOtt         24i 

will  have  much  more  ;  and  in  itself  as  a  function  it  is 
amazingly  interesting.  There  is  a  psychology  of 
assemblies  which  offers  all  manner  of  problems. 
As  we  study  the  demeanour  of  a  crowd  we  find  our- 
selves in  contact  with  subtle  laws  of  life,  with  newly- 
evolved  powers  of  which  we  are  at  present  largely 
ignorant,  but  which,  we  may  be  sure,  will  occupy 
the  science  of  the  future.  We  see,  for  instance, 
here,  how,  in  certain  directions,  a  whole  is  some- 
thing quite  different  from  the  sum  of  its  parts. 
You  could  not  at  all  reckon  the  quality  of  a  meeting 
— its  feeling,  its  probable  action — from  examining 
the  separate  qualities  of  the  individuals  composing 
it.  This  fusion  has  produced  a  new  entity  with  a 
force  and  character  of  its  own.  We  are  learning 
to-day  something  of  the  mysterious  magnetisms 
which  sweep  through  the  earth  from  equator  to 
pole.  There  is  a  still  mightier  magnetic  evolution 
in  the  coming  together  of  the  thousand  life-centres 
of  which  a  great  audience  is  composed.  Shall  we 
ever  be  able  to  measure  the  range,  or  catch  the 
full  effect  of  the  vibrations  then  set  up  in  the 
invisible  ethers  that  surround  us  ? 

Observe,  too,  the  miracle  that  is  wrought  in 
this  business  of  public  speech.  That  out  of  throat, 
vocal  chords,  tongue,  teeth,  lips,  we  can  produce  at 
will,  with  unvarying  accuracy,  these  myriad  sounds; 
announce  them  as  the  translation  of  our  subtlest 
thought  and  feeling  ;  and  that  these  air  waves, 
vibrating  at  inconceivable  velocities,  should  be 
caught  on  the  tympanum  of  our  neighbour,  and 
be  translated  back  in  his  brain  once  more  to  the 
invisibles  of  his  thought  and  feeling,  is  assuredly 

16 


242        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

wonderful  enough.  But  that  is  not  all.  A  public 
meeting  repeats  before  our  eyes  the  wonder  of  the 
five  thousand,  fed  from  one  tiny  store,  which  does 
not  diminish  in  the  process.  The  one  speech 
spreads  itself  over  the  entire  assembly.  Each 
member  of  it  takes  the  whole  ;  yet  his  absorption 
of  that  whole  diminishes  no  whit  the  portion  of 
his  neighbour.  Here,  surely,  is  a  mystery  of 
"  the  many  and  the  one "  greater  than  those 
expounded  of  Parmenides  !  On  the  other  hand,  to 
the  psychological  whole  furnished  by  an  assembly 
every  separate  member,  though  he  utters  no 
word,  contributes  an  appreciable  part.  If  we 
had  proper  instruments  for  inner  measurement  we 
should  be  able  to  register  the  exact  effect  which 
each  member  of  an  audience  produces  on  the 
speakers,  and  on  the  psychological  entity  of  the 
entire  gathering.  Another  department  for  our 
instruments  would  be  the  progress  of  inner  move- 
ment in  the  assembly — the  gradual  fusion  that 
takes  place  under  the  influence  of  genuine  oratory 
by  which  the  separate  souls,  as  it  were,  melt  into 
one  and  become  a  kind  of  huge  common  conscious- 
ness which  laughs,  sorrows,  exults  together. 

This  fusion,  in  its  entirety,  is  rarely  accom- 
plished. A  cultivated  speaker,  with  a  difficult 
theme,  and  delivering  himself,  we  will  say,  with 
the  cool,  average  English  utterance,  will  at  one 
and  the  same  time  be  making  a  thousand  different 
speeches  to  the  thousand  auditors  before  him. 
Each  man  will  interpret  the  speaker's  words  accord- 
ing to  his  standpoint,  according  to  the  level  of 
his  culture  and  comprehension.  It  is  amongst 


PUBLIC  MEETING  RELIGION          243 

the  more  emotional  races,  which  produce]  at  once 
the  genuine  orators  and  the  ideal  audiences,  that 
the  full  magnetic  possibilities  of  speech  are  realised. 
The  result  here  is  not  so  much  opinion  as  feeling. 
The  effect,  indeed,  is  largely  that  of  music.  The 
oration  is  a  chant.  The  sentences  group  them- 
selves in  a  rhythmic  combination.  We  have 
listened  to  French  and  to  Welsh  orators  who  have 
in  this  way  stirred  the  soul  precisely  as  great 
music  stirs  it.  The  words  we  listen  to  are  creat- 
ing their  effect  not  by  the  ideas  or  facts  they 
impart ;  they  seem,  in  both  the  speaker's  soul 
and  our  own,  to  be  but  the  foam  on  the  surface 
of  a  deep  hurrying  flood  of  emotion,  that  bears 
both  him  and  ourselves  away  in  its  mighty  move- 
ment. 

When  we  come  to  estimate  the  meeting  as  a 
factor  in  public  life,  we  find  an  accurate  and  dis- 
criminating judgment  to  be  a  difficult  business. 
Good  and  evil  are  so  closely  mingled  in  the  part 
it  has  played.  Froude  had  a  theory  that  eloquence 
was  a  public  bane,  and  that  orators  were  never  to 
be  trusted.  He  divided  men  into  talkers  and 
doers,  to  the  immense  disparagement  of  the 
former.  But  the  distinction  is  baseless.  There 
are  speeches  that  are  mighty  deeds.  Caesar  was  as 
potent  with  pen  and  tongue  as  with  the  sword. 
Athanasius,  Augustine,  St.  Francis,  Luther,  Pitt, 
are  names  of  giants  who  hewed  fresh  channels 
for  the  human  stream  to  run  in,  and  did  it  as 
much  by  speech  as  by  act.  We  have  to  remember 
here  Plato's  distinction,  in  the  Gorgias,  of  the 
two  kinds  of  rhetoric — one  which  is  mere  flattery 


244         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

and  declamation,  '  the  other  which  is  noble 
and  aims  at  the  training  and  improvement  of 
the  souls  of  the  citizens."  The  Greeks,  indeed, 
had  full  experience  of  the  good  and  evil  of  the 
public  meeting.  The  government  of  the  republics 
was  largely  a  government  of  rhetoric.  The  art  of 
speech  took  first  place  in  a  liberal  education ; 
for  in  a  democracy  it  was  felt  that  in  the  faculty  of 
stirring  the  multitude  lay  the  surest  way  to  power. 
A  Pericles,  a  Demosthenes  held  sway  by  eloquence. 
Not  the  less  did  the  wisest  minds  discern  the  peril 
here.  We  remember  Plato's  famous  comparison 
of  the  populace  to  a  huge,  passionate  animal, 
and  his  declaration  that  the  skill  of  the  governor 
consists  in  gaining  his  ends  by  flattering  its  humours. 
It  was  this  aspect  of  the  matter  that,  doubtless, 
led  him  later  to  speak  of  democracy  as  ':  the  worst 
of  lawful  governments." 

The  public  meeting  as  a  factor  in  affairs  has, 
perhaps,  nowhere  shown  a  more  mixed  record 
than  in  the  story  of  religion.  In  some  departments 
of  it  the  influence  one  must  confess,  has  been  of  the 
most  sinister  kind.  And  nowhere  more  notably 
than  in  the  elucidation  of  religious  truth  ;  in  the 
region,  that  is  to  say,  of  dogmatic  theology.  The 
idea  of  discovering  and  authoritatively  declaring 
truths  by  means  of  public  meetings  would  be 
scouted  as  in  the  highest  degree  absurd  by  the 
modern  scientist ;  yet  it  is  precisely  in  this  way 
that  the  Church  creeds,  which  undertake  to  settle 
for  us  the  profoundest  questions  of  human  life, 
reached  their  affirmations.  When  we  try  to  think 
of  a  Newton  or  of  a  Darwin  proposing  to  themselves 


PUBLIC  MEETING  RELIGION          245 

to  accept,  in  their  separate  departments,  the  resolu- 
tions of  a  heated  assembly  as  the  proper  way  of 
deciding  on  the  planetary  motion,  or  the  descent  of 
man,  we  begin  to  understand  the  difference  between 
the  fourth  century  and  our  own  on  the  criteria  of 
truth.  And  yet  it  is  on  the  results  of  the  fourth- 
century  methods  that  the  Church  still  professes 
to  found  its  doctrine  !  And  what  public  meetings 
these  Church  assemblies  were  !  We  think  of  the 
second  Council  of  Ephesus,  "  the  robber  synod," 
where,  amid  wildest  uproar,  the  Patriarch  of  Con- 
stantinople was  trampled  to  death.  We  remember 
how  the  Council  which  gave  us  the  Nicene  Creed 
acted  under  the  orders  of  an  Emperor  ;  while  a 
later  Council,  under  the  dictation  of  his  successor, 
fastened  on  the  Church  a  directly  opposite  affirma- 
tion. At  the  Council  of  Trent  it  was  the  persuasive 
eloquence  of  the  Jesuit  Lainez  that  carried  the 
assembly  on  point  after  point  of  doctrinal  dispute. 
To  the  modern  mind  the  search  after  truth  is  an 
affair  of  the  ripest  intellects,  to  be  carried  on  year 
after  year  in  silence,  by  constant,  patient  experi- 
ment and  slow  deduction.  In  theology  we  see 
truth,  or  what  passes  for  it,  declared  to  the  world 
on  the  authority  of  public  gatherings,  torn  by  fiercest 
passions,  swayed  by  facile  oratory,  or  coerced 
and  dictated  to  by  a  tyrant  Emperor.  That  the 
Church  has  survived  such  processes  and  such  nursing 
fathers  is  surely  the  best  evidence  of  the  innate, 
immortal  vigour  at  its  heart. 

But  the  influence  of  the  public  meeting  in  religion 
has  not  been  all  of  this  kind.  Misused,  it  has 
often  enough  helped  the  enslavement  of  the  human 


246         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

spirit.  Into  her  hands  it  has  been  a  mighty  instru- 
ment of  liberation.  The  entire  difference  between 
Romanism  and  Protestantism,  one  might  say, 
is  exhibited  in  their  use  of  the  public  meeting. 
The  one  has  used  it  for  forging  chains,  the  other 
for  breaking  them.  There  was  a  humble  Baptist 
meeting  in  London  in  the  early  seventeenth  century, 
of  which  Masson,  in  his  "  Life  of  Milton,"  thus 
writes  :  "  The  obscure  Baptist  congregation  seems 
to  have  become  the  depositary  for  all  England  of 
the  absolute  principle  of  liberty  of  conscience. 
.  .  .  It  is,  in  short,  from  this  little  dingy  meeting- 
house somewhere  in  old  London  that  there  flashed 
out  first  in  England  the  absolute  doctrine  of  religious 
liberty."  One  may  compare  this  with  what  went  on 
in  another  obscure  meeting-house  on  the  other  side 
of  the  Atlantic,  when  Dr.  Hopkins,  of  Newport, 
Massachusetts,  preaching  to  a  congregation  whose 
capital  was  largely  embarked  in  the  slave  trade,  aj; 
the  peril  of  his  position  and  livelihood,  declared  the 
whole  business  an  unchristian  iniquity ;  and,  so 
saying,  started  the  movement  which  finally  liberated 
the  slave. 

The  fortunes  of  Protestantism  have  hitherto 
been  linked  largely  with  those  of  the  public  meeting. 
Its  worship,  its  propaganda,  have  been  through  the 
popular  assembly.  Its  force  has  been  largely  in 
speech,  in  preaching,  in  the  enthusiasm,  the  emotion 
of  the  crowd.  It  was  thus  that  Luther,  Zwingli, 
Calvin  fought  for  the  Reformation.  It  was  among 
their  gathered  crowds  that  Wesley  and  Whitefield 
sowed  the  seeds  of  the  evangelical  revival.  It  is 
amid  thejglow  of  impassioned  oratory  that  the 


PUBLIC  MEETING  RELIGION  247 

religious  leaders  of  to-day  stir  the  multitude  to 
repentance  and  reformation,  and  the  Church  to 
higher  ideals  of  service. 

It  may  be,  as  we  hinted  at  the  beginning,  that 
with  the  growth  of  knowledge,  and  with  a  better 
organised  science  of  living,  the  fortunes  of  the  public 
meeting  may  undergo  a  change.  In  religion,  for 
instance,  it  is  possible  that  to  the  Catholic  era  of 
symbol  and  ceremony,  and  to  the  Protestant  era  of 
speech  and  argument,  there  may  succeed  yet 
another  in  which  the  emphasis  will  be  on  organisa- 
tion and  the  scientific  direction  of  life.  But  no 
social  development,  we  may  be  satisfied,  can  render 
obsolete  the  divine  passion  of  common  worship, 
or  stay  that  marvellous  evolution  of  the  higher 
powers  when,  under  the  magic  touch  of  the  inspired 
speaker,  a  thousand  souls  melt  into  one.  Indeed, 
in  the  common  consciousness,  shared  at  such  times 
by  a'myriad ^separate  personalities,  we  have  the  best 
suggestion  of  that  Eternal  Mind  which,  living  in  all 
the  forms  of  universal  being,  is  yet  undividedly 
One. 


XXVII 
Our  Topmost  Note 

"  HE   has   not   yet   reached   his   topmost    note  !  " 
The  remark,  which  was  made  to  the  present  writer 

•>.  awhile  ago  concerning  a  mutual  acquaintance, 
recurred  later  as  offering  matter  for  contemplation. 
It  brought  to  mind  for  one  thing  the  saying  of 
Bunsen  concerning  Gladstone  :  "  Gladstone  is  the 
first  man  in  England  as  to  intellectual  power,  and 
he  has  heard  higher  tones  than  anyone  else  in 
the  land."  There  is  a  suggestive  variation  here 
in  the  reference.  Gladstone,  according  to  Bunsen, 

t>  had  heard  tones,  whereas  our  topic  is  the  producing 
of  them.  Yet  the  meaning  is  essentially  the  same. 
For  a  man  produces  in  proportion  as  he  hears. 
According  to  the  note  that  falls  on  our  soul,  out 
of  the  music  that  sounds  in  the  'invisible,  is  our 
life  made. 

And  herein  we  come  upon  a  fundamental  difference 
between  man  and  the  things  that  surround  him. 
We  know  matter,  in  all  its  forms,  by  its  properties. 
And  these  properties  are  always  the  same.  Oxygen 
never  surpasses  itself  ;  it  is  always  oxygen.  When  we 
know  granite  we  know  its  best  and  worst.  We  can 
build  it  into  our  wall,  or  hew  it  into  our  statue, 

248 


OUR  TOPMOST  NOTE  249 

sure  that  it  will  neither  rise  above  nor  drop  beneath 
its  level  of  quality.  There  are,  of  course,  hidden  pos- 
sibilities in  our  granite  or  our  oxygen  which  a  deeper 
intelligence  than  ours  can  see  into,  but  our  asser- 
tion about  them  is  good  enough  for  practical  purposes. 
And  it  points,  we  say,  to  the  whole  difference 
between  these  things  and  ourselves. 

For  the  certainty,  the  knownness,  the  invariability, 
we  predicate  of  our  oxygen  is  precisely  the  element 
that  is  lacking  in  ourselves.  We  may  have  had 
our  neighbour's  acquaintance  for  forty  years  ;  have 
studied  all  his  words  and  acts  during  that  time  ;  and 
et  b 


_ 

The  greatest  part  of  him  is  hid  from  you,  and 
perhaps  from  himself.  This  is  specially  true  ofi 
his  upper  ranges.  The  mass  of  us,  indeed,  fail,  in 
this  world,  to  reach  our  highest.  /The  precise! 
conjuncture  of  circumstance  necessary  for  that 
does  not  arrive.  And  so  our  topmost^  notejs  never 
struck.  In  a  musical  instrument  all  the  parts, 
all  the  strings,  keys,  hammers  are  there,  the  same 
now  as  yesterday.  It  has  its  scale,  and  goes  never 
beyond  it.  You  can  strike  its  top  note  any  hour 
of  the  day  and  be  sure  of  the  response.  But  the 
instrument  we  call  "  ourselves  "  is  not  built  that 
way.  The  Maker  of  it  has  doubtless  views  about 
it,  but  they  are  only  partially  disclosed.  We  have 
our  fingers  on  the  keys,  and  make  out  something 
of  a  tune.  But  we  are  quite  ignorant  of  its  ultimate 
range  ;  and  we  have  the  vaguest  knowledge,  so 
far,  of  the  music  which  it  is  designed  to  produce 

What  tyros  we  are  in  these  matters  is  seen  when 
we  contemplate  the  various  views  people  have   as 


250        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

to  what  constitutes  life's  highest  note.  There  is, 
of  course,  a  material  side  about  which  there  is 
practically  no  controversy,  It  is  comparatively 
easy  to  say  when  a  man  is  physically  strongest, 
when  his  bone  and  muscle  are  at  the  top  of  their 
condition.  Plato,  in  the  Republic,  put  the  elect 
age  of  woman  as  between  twenty  and  forty,  and  of 
man  as  between  twenty-five  and  fifty-five.  This, 
he  said,  is  the  period  during  which  they  are  to  pro- 
duce children  to  the  State.  It  is  a  different  thing, 
however,  to  maintain,  as  some  have  done,  that  the 
inner  life,  in  its  range  of  sensation  and  accomplish- 
ment, corresponds  to  this  adjustment.  Froude, 
when  in  a  pessimistic  mood  following  on  the  death 
of  his  wife,  said  to  Sir  George  Colley  that  "  the 
interest  of  life  to  a  thinking  man  was  exhausted  at 
thirty  or  thirty-five."  But  he  lived  to  revise  that 
judgment  and  to  find  old  age  sufficiently  pleasant. 
There  is  indeed  here,  despite  some  notable  exceptions, 
a  general  consenus  of  the  best  minds  in  favour 
of  Channing's  view  that  "  life  is  a  gift  which  acquires 
a  greater  value  every  day." 

But  the  point  we  are  now  seeking  is  as  to  what 
constitutes -the .. top ,  note,  the  supreme  height  of 
life.  The  differences  of  view,  we  say,  are  so  curious. 
It  takes  all  sorts  to  make  a  world,  and  each  type 
has  on  this  question  ventilated  its  theory.  A 
Madame  du  Chatelet  is  of  opinion  that  "  we  have 
v  nothing  else  to  do  in  the  world  than  to  obtain 
agreeable  sensations  and  sentiments."  The  idea 
exactly  fitted  a  society  which  Sainte  Beuve  has 
delineated  as  from  top  to  bottom  incurably  frivolous. 
There  are  masses  of  people  whose  supreme  moment 


OUR  TOPMOST  NOTE  251 

is  the  culmination  of  a  debauch.  A  City  alderman 
was  quoted  in  our  hearing  as  saying  that  at  a 
certain  age  all  that  was  left  was  the  pleasures  of 
the  table.  We  will  not  stop  to  characterise  that 
deliverance.  Other  men  have  found  their  rapture 
in  battle— Caesar  did  and  Napoleon.  That  stout 
old  soldier,  Marshal  Manteuffel,  expressed  the 
warrior  note  in  a  sentence  which  all  the  great 
fighters  would  probably  have  endorsed :  "  That 
elevated  sentiment  of  commanding  in  battle,  of 
knowing  that  the  bullet  of  the  enemy  may  call  you 
at  any  moment  before  God's  tribunal,  of  knowing 
that  the  fate  of  the  battle,  and  consequently  the 
destiny  of  your  country,  may  depend  upon  the 
orders  which  you  give — this  tension  of  mind  an4 
of  feelings  is  divinely  great."  Doubtless  it  is, 
and  yet  one  reflects  that  beneath  this  top  note  in 
the  General  what  undertones  there  are  of  un- 
noted suffering  in  his  men  !  Of  the  great  moments 
of  the  battlefield  we  have  to  say  with  Horace 
Walpole  :  "  What  is  the  fame  of  men  compared 
to  their  happiness  ?  How  many  must  be  wretched 
before  one  can  be  renowned  !  " 

There  are  people  who,  as  we  have  seen,  place 
their  highest  moments  in  sensation  ;  others,  again 
in  action ;  others,  from  Plotinus  to  Wordsworth, 
have  found  them  in  contemplation.  And  there  are 
still  other  forms  yet  to  be  enumerated.  But  we 
may  stop  at  this  point  to  observe  that  men  of  all 
conditions,  in  seeking  what  they  deem  their  highest, 
Took  always  for  some  kind  of  reinforcement  of  their 
normal  self.  The  reinforcement  is  noTlilways  of 
the  ^best^kind.  Enivrez-vous,  cries  Baudelaire  in 


252        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

one  of  his  prose  poems  :  and  the  exhortation,  even 
by  some  of  the  cho'cer  sp;rits,  has  often  been 
only  too  literally  carried  out.  Ue  Quincey  reached 
his  thought-paradise  through  opium,  as  did  Coleridge. 
Lamb's  "  Confessions  of  a  ITFunkard  "  were  not, 
Bias,  pure  imagination.  His  friend  Crossley  declares 
that  "  on  one  evening,  when  in  manner,  speech 
and  walk  Lamb  was  obviously  under  the  influence 
of  what  he  had  drunk,  he  discoursed  at  length  upon 
Milton  with  a  fulness  of  knowledge,  an  eloquence, 
and  a  profundity  of  critical  power  which  left  an 
impression  never  to  be  effaced."  That  was  the  top 
note .  But  heights  attained  by  such  .aids  have  abys§e  s 
close  by.  What  it  feels  like  to  be  in  them  is  given 
in  a  letter  to  Coleridge,  where  Lamb  has  reached 
the  bottom.  "  I  have  been  drinking  too  much 
for  two  days  running.  I  find  my  moral  sense  in 
the  last  stage  of  a  consumption,  and  my  religion 
getting  faint."  We  see  a  glint  of  impish  humour 
in  his  eye  as  he  writes  the  words,  but  the  confession 
is,  nevertheless,  a  sorry  one.  This  is  not  the  true 
road  to  our  top,  as  none  knew  better  than  he. 

The  drug  and  stimulant  habit  is  indeed  only  a 
perversion  of  that  law  of  human  life  which  demands 
"  a  something  beyond  ourselves  "  in  order  to  the 
realisation  of  our  fullest  self.  The  poet's  muse 
is  a  psychological  reality.  Tennyson's  friends 
noticed  that  at  times  he  fell  into  a  kind  of  trance 
in  which  he  seemed  sensible  of  no  outward  thing. 
Says  De  Musset  describing  his  own  feelings  :  "  On 
ne  travaille  pas  ;  on  ecoute  ;  c'est  comme  un  inconnu 
qui  voua  parle  a  Voreille."  The  orator  has  the 
same  experience.  His  greatest  effects  are  pro- 


OUR  TOPMOST  NOTE  253 

duced  he  knows  not  how.  It  is  as  if  a  divine  fury 
seizes  him  and  carries  him  and  his  audience  away  in 
the  rush  of  its  movement.  All  the  prophets  of 
humanity  are  inspired,  whatever  be  the  form  in 
which  they  express  themselves.  Boehme  with  his  seven 
days'  sabbatical  ecstasy,  Cicero  with  his  "  divine 
afflatus,"  Socrates  with  his  daimon,  Philo  and 
Plotinus  with  then*  vision-trances  are  all  telling 
us  practically  the  same  thing.  /They  are  describing 
the  penetration  of  the  normal  mind  by  the  higher 
consciousness  which  surrounds  us,  and  which 
continually  makes  itself  known  to  the  more  attuned 
spirits/ 

Most  strange,  most  interesting,  at  times  most 
tragically  pathetic,  is  the  way  in  which  men  reach 
their  topmost  note.  There  are  those  with  whom 
it  is  a  solitary  utterance,  never  repeated.  Sidney 
Carton  finishes  his  futile  career  with  a  divine  act  of 
self-renunciation.  There  have  been  many  Sidney 
Cartons.  The  man  at  the  pit-mouth,  drunken 
often  and  foul-mouthed,  who  beat  his  wife  yesterday, 
goes  down  the  reeking  shaft  after  the  explosion 
and  lays  down  his  life  in  the  effort  to  rescue  a 
comrade.  Amid  all  his  blasphemies  and  his  brutali- 
ties, that  deed  lay  possible  in  him.  When  we 
imprison  men,  when  we  read  over  them  the  denun- 
ciations of  our  theology,  when  we  hang  them, 
what  we  denounce  and  imprison  and  hang  is  indeed 
a  sorry  affair  enough.  But  as,  in  these  processes, 
we  operate  on  our  man,  something  has  escaped  our 
touch.  In  these  worst  whom  we  thus  handle 
there  was  .a  divine  possibility,  higher,  mark  you, 
than  our  own  present  best.  Of  these  also  it  has 


254        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

to  be  said,  in  Milton's  great  words,  "  There  is 
surely  a  piece  of  Divinity  within  us,  something 
that  was  before  the  elements,  and  owing  no  homage 
to  the  sun  !  "  Will  not,  in  the  future,  the  note  of 
society  be,  with  reference  to  its  criminals  and 
failures,  not  how  to  punish  for  their  worst,  but  how 
to  help  them  to  their  best  ? 

The  cosmic  process  is  a  puzzling  one,  but  as  we 
trace  its  long,  sinuous  course  we  recognise  that  its 
effort  is  to  get  from  the  world,  from  humanity,  the 
topmost  note.  Even  the  brute  forces  of  Nature 
are  working  to  this  end.  Says  Aquinas,  in  his  deep 
way  :  "  Things  which  have  no  perception  can  only 
tend  towards  an  end  if  directed  by  a  conscious 
and  intelligent  being."  And  surely  they  are  being 
directed,  and  "  a  God  orders  the  march."  The 
suffering  of  the  world  has  this,  amongst  other 
things,  for  its  end.  "  Is  not  He  who  made  misery 
wiser  than  thou  art  ?  "  Oscar  Wilde,  out  of  the 
deeps  of  his  prison  experience,  wrote  this  :  "If 
the  world  has  been  built  of  sorrow,  it  has  been 
built  by  the  hands  of  love  ;  because  in  no  other 
-  way  could  the  soul  of  man,  for  whom  the  world 
was  made,  reach  the  full  stature  of  perfection." 

Better  men  than  Oscar  Wilde  had  discovered 
this  truth  before  him.  But  each  of  us  has  to  find 
it  out  in  his  own  way.  We  learn,  with  the  mighty 
ones  before  us,  that  the  road  to  our  topmost  is 
not  just  by  exquisite  sensations^  but  also  by  toils 
and  sacrifices  and  endurances.  Gautama  was  at 
his  highest  when  he  renounced  all  under  the  Bo 
tree,  Socrates  in  his  discourse  before  drinking  the 
hemlock,  Jesus  as  He  suffered  on  the  Cross.  Wonder- 


OUR  TOPMOST  NOTE  255 

ful  is  it,  too,  and  a  thought  that  might  well  reconcile 
us  to  everything,  that  the  road  to  the  supreme 
sensations  lies  this  way.  /You  have  not  told 
what  martyrs  felt  in  describing  the  scorch  and 
bite  of  the  flames.  There  are  sensations  within 
sensations.  Said  Dr.  Taylor,  when  he  reached 
the  stake  at  Hadleigh.  "  Thanked  be  God,  I 
am  even  at  home."  Indeed,  that  ours  has 
been,  and  is,  a  suffering  world  is  the  great- 
est thing  that  can  be  said  of  it.  Had  life  been 
plain  and  simple,  a  mere  swine-trough  happiness, 
it  had  not  been  worth  the  trouble  of  history.  Its 
significance  is  in  what  it  has  endured.  Since  i\ 
has  been  laid  upon  humanity  in  all  times  to  be  a 
cross-bearer ;  to  have  its  Gethsemane  and  its 
Golgotha,  so,  as  we  read,  must  there  have  been  also 
reserved  for  it  a  resurrection  and  ascension,  an 
exaltation  to  God's  right  hand. 


XXVIII 
The  Unpurchasables 

THE  world  history  of  late  years  has  offered  some 
singularly  impressive  examples  on  the  subject  of 
what  may  be  called  life's  imponderables.  Politics 
and  commerce  are  regions  where  the  lower  forces 
are  constantly  in  evidence,  where  wealth  and 
material  power  seem  to  have  undisputed  sway. 
Yet  it  is  just  here  where  the  illustrations  we  refer 
to  have  been  given  ;  illustrations  which  show  how 
matter  and  force,  all-controlling  as  they  seem,  are 
really  impotent  before  a  something  which  is  invisible 
and  spiritual.  In  politics  we  have  had  the  spectacle 
of  Gejrman  relations  with  France.  A  generation 
ago  Germany  attacked  and  overwhelmed  France 
with  its  military  forces.  The  conquest  seemed 
complete.  And  in  one  sphere  it  was.  In  point 
of  arms,  in  point  of  strategy,  the  Teuton  showed 
supreme.  He  won  all  in  France  except  one  thing 
— the  French  soul.  And  now,  after  three  and  a 
half  decades,  the  truth  is  dawning  on  the  conqueror 
that,  compared  with  this  imponderable,  the  milliards, 
the  territory,  the  military  glory  are  a  worthless 
asset.  Germany  to-day  yearns  for  a  thing  she 
has  not.  Her  best  men  realise  that  a  nation, 

256' 


THE  UNPURCHASABLES  257 

like  an  individual,  cannot  live  healthily  without 
the  love  and  confidence  of  its  neighbours.  And 
love  and  confidence  are  neither  to  be  bought  nor 
forced. 

The  other  example  comes  from  America.  Our 
cousins  across  the  water  are  suffering  just  now, 
like  ourselves,  from  a  wave  of  materialism  which 
is  beating  with  perilous  impact  upon  the  country's 
noblest  moral  traditions.  There  is  a  delirium  of 
display.  We  read  of  Lucullus  banquets,  of  fortunes 
spent  on  a  meal.  People  meet  at  receptions  not 
for  talk,  the  healthy  interchange  of  soul  with  soul, 
but  to  exhibit  their  jewellery.  In  reading  of  these 
affairs  the  mind  runs  not  on  social  or  mental  qualities 
so  much  as  on  the  glitter  of  costume.  To  describe 
that  one  might  fall  back  on  Marlowe  in  his  "  Jew  of 
Malta,"  and  talk  of 

Bags  of  fiery  opals,  sapphires,  amethysts, 
Jacinths,  hard  topaz,  grass  green  emeralds, 
Beauteous  rubies,  sparkling  diamonds. 

Life  has  become  a  race  as  to  who  shall  have  the 
grandest  house,  the  finest  yacht,  the  longest  purse. 
But  on  the  American  side  of  this  competition 
some  curious  things  have  happened.  In  the  great 
insurance  scandals  that  so  shocked  the  public  a 
while  ago  some  well-known  names  were  implicated. 
Men  who  had  the  finest  Puritan  tradition  behind 
them,  whose  forbears  were  scholars  and  saints, 
who  themselves  had  earned  a  reputation  for  refined 
and  scholarly  instincts,  stood  revealed  as  having 
bartered  these  imponderables  for  hard  cash.  They 
discovered  later  what  an  altogether  curious  asset 

17 


258         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

conscience  is.  You  can  sell  it.  Nothing  is  easier. 
No  stock  on  the  market  is  more  readily  moved. 
But  you  cannot  buy  it  back.  And  the  tragedy  is 
that  the  man,  once  of  high  aim  and  purpose,  who 
has  disposed  of  this  inner  outfit,  finds  too  late 
that  the  thing  which  has  passed  from  him,  and  that 
he  cannot  recall,  is  the  one  supreme  value  he 
possessed. 

An  actual  understanding  of  this  truth  is  the 
world's  clamant  need  to-day.  We  want  a  clear 
teaching,  which  shall  appeal  especially  to  the 
business  man,  as  to  the  position  of  money  in  any 
true  scheme  of  life.  We  have  abundant  treatises 
of  political  economy,  all  worthy  our  best  study. 
But  when  we  have  understood  the  theory  of  ex- 
changes, the  currency,  the  laws  which  regulate 
the  movements  of  capital,  we  find  ourselves  in 
front  of  a  question  bigger  than  all  these.  The 
currency  realm  is  that  of  the  purchasables.  But 
bordering  it,  and  touching  at  every  point,  is  a 
realm  of  unpurchasables.  And  we,  in  the  most 
puzzling  manner,  are  related  to  both,,  With  money 
in  his  pocket,  man  stands  so  curiously  between 
animal  and  spiritual.  The  beasts  do  not  carry 
purses  ;  neither  do  the  angels,  so  far  as  we  know. 
"  Aut  deus,  aut  bellua  "  ("  Either  God  or  beast  "), 
used  to  be  said  of  the  hermits  of  the  Thebaid. 
The  proverb  has  more  than  a  local  application. 
In  the  twentieth  century  we  feel  both  inside  us, 
and  are  continually  wondering  how,  in  so  strange 
a  composition  of  forces,  to  find  the  resultant. 
Political  economy,  that  teaches  so  much,  will  not 
teach  us  this.  Ricardo  and  Mill  show  the  laws  of 


THE  UNPURCHASABLES  259 

material  wealth,  but  what  we  want  first  and  most  to 
know  is  how  these  stand  to  the  deeper  laws  of  life. 

Political  economy  is  a  young  science.  The 
world  was  singularly  slow  in  grasping  the  theory  of 
the  creation  and  distribution  of  wealth  ;  but  it 
realised  very  early  how  the  property  question 
was  at  every  point  mixed  up  with  the  invisible 
values.  Cicero  in  his  remarks  on  fortune  in  the 
*'  De  Officiis,"  has  a  vivid  sense  of  the  spiritual 
side  of  riches.  "  Fortune,"  says  he,  "  should 
be  originally  acquired  with  honesty,  without  any 
scandalous  or  oppressive  practices ;  it  should  then 
be  made  serviceable  to  as  many  as  possible,  pro- 
vided they  be  worthy ;  it  should  next  be  aug- 
mented with  prudence,  by  industry  and  frugality, 
without  serving  purposes  of  pleasure  and  luxury, 
rather  than  of  generosity  and  humanity."  Here, 
we  see,  is  a  doctrine  of  capital  saturated  in  its 
every  part  with  the  moral  sentiment.  The 
Roman  sage,  who  borrowed  here  from  the  Greeks, 
his  teachers,  sees  that  the  money  question  can 
only  be  solved  by  reference  to  the  anterior  life 
question. 

A  kind  of  delirium  tremens  on  the  wealth  subject 
prevails  in  the  world  to-day  ;  otherwise  it  would 
be  difficult  to  comprehend  how  anyone  could  in 
such  a  matter  miss  his  way.  The  pointers  are  so 
numerous  and  so  unmistakable.  The  millionaire 
can  buy  all  sorts  of  things,  but  never  the  best. 
The  seventy  years  of  lusty  health  hid  in  the  ruddy 
growing  lad  yonder — can  moneybags  buy  that  ? 
He  may  be  blind,  and  that  street-hawker  across 
the  way,  with  two  eyes  in  his  head,  holds  a  treasure 


260        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

worth  more  than  the  other's  millions,  and  which 
these  cannot  purchase.  Says  poet  to  Dives,  "  The 
land  is  yours,  the  landscape  is  mine."  Our  capitalist 
may  buy  books  by  the  ton  to  fill  his  brand-new 
library.  They  are  the  world's  classics.  Does  he 
possess  them  ?  How  absurd  for  him  to  fumble 
with  his  clumsy  gold  key  at  the  delicate  lock  which 
gives  admittance  to  this  realm  !  The  key  does  not 
fit  at  all.  The  scholar,  the  kindred  spirit  to  these 
thought-kings,  has  the  open  sesame  to  their  en- 
chanted kingdom,  while  the  money-spinner,  if  he 
be  that  and  nothing  else,  must  stand  outside. 
He  can  buy  his  way  to  the  door,  and  that  is  as  far 
as  his  purse  carries. 

As  long  as  man  is  man  this  must  be  the  rule.  The 
laws  here  are  certain  and  irrevocable.  The  imponder- 
ables are  greater  than  the  things  which  are  weighed, 
measured  and  bought.  The  truth  asserts  itself  in 
all  sorts  of  ways.  At  a  company  which  comprised 
duchesses,  peers,  a  whole  crowd  of  the  fashionable 
world,  Dr.  Johnson  was  announced.  "  As  soon 
as  he  was  come,"  we  read,  "  and  had  taken  a  chair, 
the  company  began  to  collect  around  him,  till 
they  became  not  less  than  four  or  five  deep,  those 
behind  standing  and  listening  over  the  heads  of 
those  that  were  sitting  near  him."  Thus  did 
wealth  and  fashion  wait  on  the  man  of  Bolt-court, 
with  his  pension  of  £300  a  year.  "  Pauperemque 
dives  me  petit,  the  rich  man  seeks  me  the  poor 
man,"  cries  Horace  in  his  time.  The  reason  in  both 
instances  was  the  same.  The  Roman  and  the 
Englishman  had  each  a  life-value  which  Dives  in  his 
inmost  soul  knew  was  greater  than  his  own. 


THE  UNPURCHASABLES  261 

The  young  people,  who  are  to  be  the  creators 
of  the  coming  generation,  need  to  make  up  their 
minds  on  these  questions.  At  present  they  seem 
all  on  the  side  of  the  ponderables.  They  will  have 
appearances,  at  whatever  cost.  Love,  it  is  voted, 
is  not  nearly  as  good  as  a  thousand  a  year.  On 
one  side  we  see  strenuous,  fine  young  fellows, 
with  capacities  in  them  for  the  best  things.  On 
the  other  side  are  our  growing  Engh'sh  girls,  who  in 
a  right  and  sane  world,  should  blossom  into  sweet- 
est wifehood  and  motherhood.  But  our  scale  of 
living  has  gone  up.  There  are  the  social  ambi- 
tions !  Before  the  heart's  demand,  before  the 
soul's  plea,  before  affection,  strengthened  and 
refined  by  mutual  sacrifice — before  these  invisibles, 
which  are  nevertheless  the  beauty  and  glory  of 
human  life,  the  modern  code  places  as  primary 
the  mint,  anise,  cumin  of  the  dresses  one  must 
wear,  of  the  scale  of  one's  housekeeping !  So 
our  young  man  keeps  to  his  unshared  bachelor 
luxuries  ;  our  maiden  waits  for  the  offer  of  wealth  ; 
and  the  years  pass,  until  they  find  the  best  of  life, 
its  highest  fruitions  gone  beyond  their  reach, 
beyond  recall.  Traddles,  in  "  David  Copperfield," 
and  his  bride,  "  the  dearest  girl  in  the  world,"  in 
the  days  of  their  humble  but  merry  housekeeping 
in  the  young  barrister's  chambers,  used,  as  one  of 
their  enjoyments  to  look  in  at  the  West  End  shop- 
windows,  at  all  the  fine  things  they  could  not  buy, 
but  were  so  happy  without !  They  got  them  after- 
wards, but  what  was  the  later  prosperity  compared 
with  that  first  treasure,  the  treasure  of  youth, 
strength,  hope  and  love  ! 


262         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

Wealth  can  get  to  the  outskirts  of  life  ;  it  can 
never  reach  its  centres.  It  can  feed  the  lower  nature 
and  the  middle  nature,  but  never  the  highest. 
The  startling  denunciation  of  riches  which  we 
find  in  the  Fathers,  in  Basil,  in  Jerome,  in  Chrysos- 
tom  proceeded  from  the  sense,  not  only  of  the  injus- 
tice which  so  often  accompanied  their  acquirement 
and  use,  but  of  the  obstacle  their  pursuit 
offered  to  the  highest  bliss  of  the  soul.  Laurence 
Oliphant  declares  that  "  moral  truth  cannot 
be  discovered  by  a  bad  man."  We  may  add, 
"  Nor  can  it  be  discovered  by  the  mere  wealth- 
hunter."  That  road  misses  all  the  finest  prospects. 
The  soul  must  be  on  another  track  to  catch 
sight  of  these.  Judaea  knew  this  thousands  of 
years  ago  ;  so  did  India,  and  Persia,  and  Egypt. 
They  knew,  as  the  Bhagavad  Gita  has  it,  "  the 
boundless  pleasure  which  is  far  more  worthy 
of  the  understanding  than  that  which  ariseth 
from  the  senses."  They  knew,  as  Porphyry  puts 
it,  how  "  to  despise  what  will  not  be  required 
when  we  are  rid  of  the  body,  and  to  practise  that 
which  will  be  needed  when  set  free  from  it."  Mam- 
mon can  feed  only  a  bit  of  a  man  ;  can  play  upon 
but  one  string  of  his  vast  instrument,  a  string 
which  soon  wears  out  and  loses  tone. 

There  are  men  who  think  they  can  buy  heaven 
with  their  money,  and  so  they  endow  churches  and 
make  huge  testamentary  donations  to  missions  ! 
It  is  our  queer  modern  way.  It  will  be  almost 
worth  dying  to  see  the  kind  of  inheritance  these 
capitalists  have  by  such  means  secured  for  them- 
selves in  the  next  world.  There  are  certain  curren- 


THE  UNPURCHASABLES  263 

cies — such  as  Turkish  paper  money — which  shrink 
a  good  deal  in  the  process  of  exchange.  But  this 
shrinkage  will  be  nothing  in  comparison  with  the 
drop  in  value  which  awaits  some  properties  at  the 
exchange  bureau  of  death.  Some  of  us,  for  our  dis- 
cipline and  eternal  good,  will  discover  then  how 
woefully  we  have  misunderstood  the  celestial 
currency.  Wo  shall  have  to  begin  all  over  again. 


XXIX 
The   Mind's    Hospitality 

OF  the  hospitality  in  which  both  mind  and  body 
are  partakers  there  surely  is  no  more  delightful 
picture  than  that  with  which  Plato  opens  the 
"  Symposium."  Here  are  meats  and  drinks  for 
the  appetite,  but  so  much  more !  Observe  the 
courtesy,  the  good-fellowship,  the  wit  and  wisdom 
of  the  company.  Uninvited  guests  in  the  person 
of  Socrates  and  his  friend  suddenly  appear.  How 
cordially  they  are  welcomed  !  The  treatment  of 
the  servants,  too,  by  their  master  Agathon  is  so 
noteworthy.  He  will  not  give  them  orders.  He  says, 
"  Imagine  that  you  are  our  hosts,  and  that  I  and 
the  company  are  guests."  Has  our  civilisation  pro- 
duced anything  finer  than  that,  in  its  gracious 
delicacy  of  feeling  ?  And  then  the  banquet,  instead 
of  degenerating  into  an  orgy,  as  was  the  beautiful 
way  for  so  many  generations  in  Christendom,  be- 
comes the  scene  of  a  discussion  which  reaches  the 
highest  realms  of  thought.  That,  surely,  is  the 
ideal  hospitality — a  banquet  of  the  soul.  But  the 
minds  that  enjoy  such  feasts  must  first  themselves 
have  had  a  long  training  in  the  functions  of  host 
and  guest.  Let  us  look  into  this  a  little. 

264 


THE  MIND'S  HOSPITALITY  265 

The  mind  of  an  educated  man  is  the  most  generous 
host  in  the  world.  The  gates  of  the  house  are  open 
night  and  day,  and  the  stream  of  visitors  is  incessant. 
They  come  from  far  and  near,  and  are  of  every 
kind  and  quality,  and  they  find  permanent  lodging. 
Recent  investigation  has  deepened  the  conviction, 
early  entertained  by  philosophy,  that  in  its  back 
chambers  the  soul  retains  every  impression  that  has 
been  made  upon  it,  and  can  reproduce  it  under  cer- 
tain conditions.  What  our  immediate  consciousness 
seems  to  have  forgotten,  a  deeper  part  of  us  has 
not  forgotten.  We  may  quote  here  the  French 
psychologist,  M.  Maxwell  :  "  The  personal  con- 
sciousness is  only  a  facet  of  that  more  general 
consciousness  existing  in  us,  a  consciousness  where 
all  antecedent  experiences  are  piled  up,  where 
all  our  sensations  are  registered,  be  our  personal 
consciousness  aware  or  unaware  of  them."  The 
mind  staggers  at  the  thought  of  this  countless 
array  of  its  guests,  to  whose  number  fresh  myriads 
are  added  each  day,  all  permanent  forces,  all  active 
within  us,  shaping  our  personality  and  our  destiny  ! 

There  are  some  special  aspects  of  our  mind's 
hospitality  which  need,  above  all  things,  to  be 
understood  in  our  day,  so  vital  is  their  bearing 
upon  character  and  life.  Every  man  of  us,  for 
instance,  has  to  deal  with  mental  guests  of  the 
most  opposite  character,  and  the  question  is, 
What  shall  be  our  reception  of  them  ?  As  illus- 
tration of  what  we  mean,  here  are  some  of  the 
books  which  the  present  writer  in  the  course 
of  his  ordinary  studies  has  just  gone  through. 
The  experience  is  the  more  suggestive  as  it  is 


266         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

entirely  ordinary.  The  list  we  find  includes  : 
"  The  Autobiography  of  George  Muller,  of  Bristol," 
the  Address  to  the  Congregational  Union  of  Dr. 
Forsyth,  the  two  volumes  of  Dr.  Russel  Wallace's 
"  Life,"  and  a  re-study  of  Plato's  "  Republic."  The 
complete  list  would  be  much  longer,  but  let  us 
stop  at  these.  In  George  Muller  we  have  a  saintly 
man,  of  extraordinary  depth  of  religious  experi- 
ence, the  outcome  of  which  was  a  public  work 
of  incomparable  usefulness.  Mixed  with  the  faith 
which  wrought  these  wonders  there  was,  we  read, 
with  George  Muller  a  profound  belief  in  the  full 
inspiration  and  inerrancy  of  every  word  of  the 
Bible,  the  book  which  he  studied  to  the  exclusion, 
in  later  years,  of  almost  every  other.  Dr.  Forsyth, 
in  a  deliverance  of  remarkable  depth  and  power, 
advocates  a  doctrine  of  Atonement  and  of  grace 
which  Muller  would  have  been  delighted  to  recog- 
nise, but  combines  with  it  a  view  of  the  Scriptures 
which  the  Bristol  saint  would  have  rejected  with 
horror.  In  Wallace's  life  we  have  the  story  of  a 
man  of  genius  and  of  intense  sincerity,  the  intimate  of 
Darwin,  of  Lyell  and  of  Huxley,  who  is  won  from 
a  position  of  scientific  agnosticism  to  one  of  religious 
belief  by  his  investigations  in  spiritualism.  And, 
finally,  Plato  offered  us  for  the  twentieth  time  his 
conception  of  the  perfect  life,  individual  and  com- 
munal, a  conception  which  knows  nothing  of  the 
Scriptures,  of  the  Atonement,  of  the  doctrine  of 
grace. 

What  is  to  be  the  attitude  of  the  earnest  mind, 
in  its  contact  with  these  other  minds,  all  equally  in 
earnest  ?  How  shall  we  save  ourselves  from  utter 


THE  MIND'S  HOSPITALITY  267 

confusion  amid  the  Babel  of  opposing  authorities  ? 
Of  course,  there  is  one  way  which  many  excellent 
people  have  followed  and  do  follow — that  of  simple 
exclusion.  They  read  and  hear  nothing  from  the 
contrary  side.  There  are  religionists  who  know 
nothing  of  science,  and  scientific  men  who  know 
nothing  of  theology.  And  it  will  not  do  to  be  too 
impatient  with  this  attitude.  A  wide  and  sym- 
pathetic study  of  human  nature  forces  more  and 
more  upon  us  the  conviction  that  the  power  which 
is  moving  humanity  to  its  high  destinies  has  de- 
liberately, in  many  instances,  formed  and  used 
the  closed  mind  for  some  of  the  best  work.  We 
shall  never  understand  history  without  recognising 
the  mission  of  illusion.  There  are  men  set  to  see 
one  side  of  truth,  a  side  big  enough  in  itself  to  fill 
their  soul,  and  to  produce  in  them  precisely  the 
force  requisite  to  the  doing  of  their  own  work  in 
the  world.  It  is  when  we  have  properly  understood 
this  that  we  shall  avoid  the  narrowness  of  calling 
other  men  narrow. 

But  all  have  not  this  mission,  nor  this  class  of 
mind.  The  highest  and  most  difficult  task  in  the 
education  of  our  race  falls  to  those  who  see  not 
one  side,  but  all  sides;  who  welcome  every  guest 
who  brings  what  he  holds  to  be  a  truth  ;  who 
weigh  dispassionately  each  claim,  and  give  it  its 
due  place,  and  who,  in  their  doctrine  of  life  show 
how  these  differing  voices  in  their  combination 
make  a  vaster  and  deeper  harmony.  To  reach  that 
standpoint  is  no  easy  task.  It  has  meant  for  some 
of  us  to  journey  through  a  great  and  terrible  wilder- 
ness, where  at  times  the  fainting  soul  loses  all 


268         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

expectation  of  reaching  the  promised  land.  He 
who  has  known  what  it  is  to  find  his  inherited  faith 
shattered  by  what  seemed  an  irrefutable  opposing 
argument,  will  understand  what  we  mean.  He 
knows  that  inward  desolation  when  the  heavenly 
lights  which  guided  him  have  gone  out,  and  there 
is  without  and  within  a  darkness  which  may  be 
felt.  That  staggering  experience  came  to  the  pre- 
sent writer  when,  as  a  raw  student,  he  first  read 
Comte.  But  these  mental  phases,  we  find  after- 
wards, are  amongst  the  best  features  of  our  training. 
They  are  like  the  recruit's  first  battle.  He  knows 
now  the  smell  of  powder.  When  the  guns 
go  off  later  on  he  feels  none  of  the  first  tremors. 
We  can  read  a  dozen  Comtes  to-day  without  turn- 
ing a  hair.  We  learn  by  this  discipline  the  true 
function  of  the  negative.  It  comes  not  to  destroy, 
but  to  widen  and  purify  our  positive.  The  "  no  " 
of  our  opponent  makes  our  "  yes  "  fuller  than  it 
used  to  be,  and  better  worth  believing.  We  dis- 
cover, in  fact,  that  the  "  no  "  is  not  only  in  our 
opponent ;  it  is  in  us,  and  there  always  to  help 
the  inner  building,  to  clear  the  ground  of  rubbish. 
Knowing  all  this  we  join  heartily  with  Kipling  in 
those  rollicking  but  deep  lines  of  his  : 

Something  I  owe  to  the  soil  that  grew, 

More  to  the  life  that  fed, 
But  most  to  Allah  who  gave  me  two 

Separate  sides  to  my  head. 
I  would  go  without  shirts  or  shoes, 

Friends,  tobacco  or  bread, 
Sooner  than  for  an  instant  lose 

Either  side  of  my  head. 


THE  MIND'S  HOSPITALITY  269 

In  those  of  us  who  have  reached  this  point,  one 
irrevocable  determination  has  emerged.  It  is  that 
of  being  hospitable  to  all  great  thinking  and  all 
great  living,  but  to  be  enslaved  by  none  of  it.  We 
are  determined  on  never  being  tyrannised  over  by 
goodness,  any  more  than  by  badness.  To  weak 
minds  the  reading  of  religious  biography  is,  in  some 
of  its  effects,  almost  as  disastrous  as  dram  drinking. 
The  poor  souls  think  they  must  straightway  model 
their  whole  selves  on  this  man  they  read  about. 
They  must  adopt  all  his  opinions,  all  his  narrow- 
ness. It  is  so  utterly  wrong.  The  great  fact,  the 
great  life  are  there  to  instruct,  to  inspire,  but 
never  to  dominate  us.  God  has  made  you  and  me 
to  be  a  separate  thought  of  His  own,  not  to  be  a 
pale  reflection  of  someone  else.  We  welcome 
our  mind's  guests,  and  all  they  offer  us.  There 
shall  be  a  free  exchange  of  courtesies  and  good 
offices.  The  interview  leaves  us,  let  us  hope, 
helped  and  stirred.  But  heaven  help  us  if  it  has 
robbed  us  of  ourselves  ! 

This  openness  of  the  mind  will  not  be  an  in- 
difference to  the  character  of  the  guests.  Far 
otherwise.  To  freedom  of  access  will  be  joined  the 
most  rigid  discrimination.  Into  such  a  soul  a 
truth,  though  clad  in  humblest  guise,  unpopular, 
scorned  and  hated,  issuing  from  the  most  ill- 
reputed  Nazareth,  if  it  prove  its  claim,  will  be 
admitted.  On  the  other  hand  the  fraud,  the 
unfounded  assumption,  though  splendidly  apparelled 
and  heralded  with  utmost  pomp,  will  be  quietly 
but  decisively  put  to  the  door. 

Finally,    the    mind's    hospitality    will    have    its 


270         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

most  gracious  exercise  in  the  preparation  for  and 
reception  of  the  highest  guests.  And  here  we  are 
thinking  not  of  the  great  minds  that  teach  us  from 
all  the  centuries.  For  these  indeed  there  is  pre- 
paration needed.  The  mind  must  be  perpetually 
enlarged  to  give  them  houseroom.  But  there  are 
greater  even  than  these  that  come  to  us.  Man  is 
a  haunted  being.  His  soul  is  the  playground  of 
spiritual  forces  beyond  his  knowing.  Behind  all 
our  conceptions,  our  imaginings,  is  a  something 
unexpressed,  deeper  than  all  expression  or  even 
comprehension.  It  is  when  we  turn  to  this  region 
we  understand  that  "  the  final  mystery  is  oneself." 
It  is  out  of  its  dim  shadow-land  that  all  the  deepest, 
newest  truth  emerges.  And  it  is  here,  down  at 
the  centre,  we  learn  that  the  secret  of  life  is  a 
spiritual  one.  Says  Emerson,  "  the  foundation  of 
culture  as  of  character  is  at  last  moral.  If  we 
live  truly  we  shall  see  truly."  It  can  be  put  in 
higher  terms  than  these.  The  capacity  of  becom- 
ing conscious  of  the  Infinite,  which  Lotze  declares 
to  be  the  speciality  of  the  human  mind,  is  another 
way  of  describing  the  highest  of  the  mind's  hospi- 
talities. For  the  soul  can  receive  this  Infinite. 
But  only  in  one  way.  The  August  Visitant  comes 
to  the  pure  in  heart.  The  blessed  are  those  whose 
daily  vision  and  whose  daily  guest  is  God. 


XXX 

Of    Religious    Union 

RELIGIOUS  uoion  has  a  psychology  and  a  history. 
To  see  our  way  into  it,  to  understand  the  true  con- 
ditions of  spiritual  association,  we  need  to  study 
both.  The  psychology  of  the  matter  is  compara- 
tively simple.  The  facts  of  our  nature  on  which 
it  rests  are  patent  and  obvious.  The  religious 
feeling,  like  other  feelings,  is,  as  we  all  speedily 
discover,  subject  to  enormous  augmentation  by 
association  and  fellowship.  A  thousand  souls 
thrilled  by  a  common  sentiment  or  emotion  become, 
as  it  were,  an  electric  power-station,  which  sends 
its  accumulated  force  through  each  component. 
Each  who  helps  to  form  the  whole  receives  the  full 
current  generated  by  the  whole.  The  symptoms 
shown  by  a  crowd  would  not  be  felt  by  the  indi- 
viduals composing  it  if  they  stood  alone.  The  in- 
fluence here  is  not  a  merely  physical  one.  When 
men  sing  and  pray  together  it  is  not  only  the  volume 
of  sound  that  produces  the  combined  effect.  The 
voice  of  a  solitary  singer  will  often  thrill  an  audience 
more  than  the  thunder  of  the  chorus.  The  aug- 
mented feeling  results  most  of  all  from  a  fusion  of 
soul.  The  one  utterance  has  set  a  thousand  in- 

271 


272         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

terior  organs  throbbing,  whose  unseen  vibrations 
fill  the  atmosphere,  stirring  it  into  psychic  waves 
which  roll  with  cumulative  effect  upon  each  separate 
mind  and  heart. 

We  have  here  a  natural  cause  of  religious  union, 
inherent  in  the  human  constitution,  and  which 
we  find  at  work,  producing  similar  results,  throughout 
the  whole  period  of  history.  Next  comes  the  tribal 
system,  derived  originally,  some  sociologists  think, 
from  the  herd  organisation  of  animals.  Each 
tribe,  with  its  totem  symbol,  had  its  religion,  and 
modern  researchers  trace  the  peculiar  intensity 
of  the  odium  theologicum,  of  religious  intolerance, 
to  the  fact  that  in  primitive  times  for  a 
man  to  disavow  the  ancestral  faith  was  the 
same  thing  as  to  break  with  his  tribal  fealty, 
to  them  the  first  and  fundamental  law  of  the 
social  life. 

To  come  now  to  what  concerns  us  more  closely, 
religious  union  as  related  to  Christianity.  We 
have  here  an  extraordinary  history,  crowded  with 
enigmas,  which  we  have  by  no  means  solved  as  yet. 
Christianity  began  as  a  break-off  from  the  religious 
unity  of  the  nation  in  which  it  was  born,  and  the 
formation  of  a  new  centre  of  fellowship.  This 
centre  was  a  Person,  and  the  principle  of  union 
was  attachment  to  that  Person.  The  whole  genius 
of  Christianity  as  a  new  spiritual  departure  lay 
in  that  fact.  Had  the  Church  in  later  ages  cor- 
rectly interpreted  it,  what  troubles,  what  cruelties, 
what  unspeakable  miseries  had  been  spared  the 
world  !  (^The  Christianity  of  the  group  that  gathered 
|  round  Jesus  was  a  Christianity  of  admiration  and 


OF  RELIGIOUS  UNION  273 

love.  It  was  an  immense  feeling,  as  yet  undefined. 
Imagine  the  astonishment  of  these  peasants  had 
an  Athanasian  Creed  or  a  Westminster  Catechism' 
been  offered  them  as  a  correct  exposition  of  their 
Galilean  faith  !  The  thing  that  dominated  them, 
that  held  them  together,  was  what  Renan  has 
called  "the  Divine  lovableness  "  of  their  Master. 


And  that,  aft.p.r  a.Ilr  js  the  true  Chqatiaft  bond.    It 

is  the  tie  of  a  subtle,  untranslatable  spiritual  affinity. 
Christ  was  the  new  term  in  religious  evolution 
round  which  the  higher  life  of  the  world  instinctively 
gathered.  His  voice  woke  a  hitherto  unheard 
music  in  the  soul.  Christ  still  creates  that  music. 
The  present  writer  remembers,  as  if  it  were  yester- 
day, and  will  remember  to  his  dying  day,  the 
thrill  which  passed  through  his  being  when,  as 
a  mere  boy,  he  realised  that  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  was  addressed  to  him,  that  of  this  /' 
spiritual  feast  he  was  invited  to  partake  !  What 
were  all  the  books  of  evidences,  all  the  theological 
arguments,  as  instruments  of  conviction,  com- 
pared with  that  stir  of  the  deepest  nature  !  It 
is  that  same  thrill,  that  inmost  essence  of  the 
heart  of  Jesus,  as  it  exhales  in  word  and  touch 
and  deed,  that  ever  since  has  been  converting  the 
world. 

This,  we  say,  was  the  Church's  first  bond  of 
union.  But  it  did  not  last  long.  In  the  first 
century  of  our  era  there  were  other  things  in  the 
world  besides  the  new  Gospel  —  things  full  grown 
and  mighty,  which,  as  events  showed,  were  to  play 
a  huge  and  sinister  part  in  the  Church's  evolution. 
And  the  greatest  of  these  was  the  Roman  dominion, 

18 


274        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

with  its  military  power  and  its  perfect  organisation. 
We  talk  often  of  Christianity  as  conquering  the 
Roman  Empire.  Let  us  not  forget  the  extent  to 
which,  in  return,  the  Roman  Empire  conquered 
Christianity.  Nothing,  to  the  student  of  the  human 
movement,  is  more  instructive  than  to  see  the  way 
in  which  in  those  early  centuries  the  original  Gospel 
energy  was  captured  by  the  old  Roman  military 
idea,  and  turned  into  its  moulds.  The  Catholic 
Church  of  the  early  and  middle  centuries  was  the 
old  Empire  reappearing  under  an  ecclesiastical 
form.  The  Roman  bishop  was  its  Pontifex  Maxi- 
mus  ;  the  dioceses,  with  their  spiritual  heads,  re- 
produced the  ancient  provinces  with  their  prefects  ; 
jtnonks  and  priests  were  the  new  style  of  legionaries. 
The  imperial  idea  of  unity  maintained  by  force 
was  carried  over  undiminished  to  the  Christian 
society.  Augustine  frankly  taught  it ;  and  the 
popes,  with  an  ever-increasing  severity,  applied 
his  teaching.  Gregory  the  Great,  one  of  the  noblest 
of  them,  writing  to  his  agent  in  Sicily,  tells  him 
"  he  will  allow  no  Manichaeans  on  the  Church 
estates  "  ;  he  is  "to  persecute  them  and  reclaim 
them^to  the  Catholic  faith."  How  the  Church 
proceeded  to  "  reclaim "  heretics  is  seen  in 
a  course  during  which,  in  Lecky's  words,  ("She 
shed  more  innocent  blood  than  any  other 
institution  that  has  ever  existed  among  mankind.'/* 
The  greatest  saints  were  amongst  the  greatest 
persecutors.  Fenelon  approved  the  Dragonnades  ; 
St.  Charles  Borromeo  recommended  the  murder 
of  Protestants. 

.The  great  break-up  of  the  Reformation  brought 


OF  RELIGIOUS  UNION  275 

many  changes  and  many  improvements,  but  it 
made  small  advance  towards  a  true  theory  of 
religious  union.  Force,  exerted  this  way  or  that, 
was  regarded  by  Protestants  as  a  legitimate  instru- 
ment for  its  promotion.  Calvin  allowed  Servetus 
to  be  burned,  though  he  by  no  means  deserves  the 
greatest  blame  attaching  to  that  transaction. 
Luther  would  have  no  terms  with  Zwingli  for  his 
difference  on  the  sacraments.  The  smaller  sects 
were  as  bad.  The  Minister  Anabaptists  did  not 
hesitate  to  put  to  death  any  who  did  not  agree  with 
their  views.  It  is,  strangely  enough,  from  Catho- 
licism that  we  obtain  in  that  time  the  suggestion  for 
a  better  way.  "  I  would  not  make  violence  and 
bloodshed  my  means  to  assert  the  Gospel,"  says 
Erasmus.  And  what  a  really  wonderful  thing, 
considering  the  time  and  all  the  circumstances, 
is  that  utterance  of  Catholic  Sir  Thomas  More, 
where  in  the  "  Utopia,"  written,  remember,  under 
the  nose  of  Henry  VIII.,  he  declares,  "  This 
should  surely  be  thought  a  very  unmeet  and 
foolish  thing,  and  a  point  of  arrogant  presumption, 
to  compel  all  others  by  violence  and  threaten- 
ing to  agree  to  the  same  that  thou  believest 
to  be  true  !  "  But  these  men  were  before  their 
time.  The  real  basis  of  fellowship  had  still  to  wait 
its  hour. 

What  has  helped  towards  the  true  solution 
has  been  science  rather  than  theology.  A  new 
cosmic  conception  has  dawned  upon  the  human 
mind,  which  throws  everything,  Church  and 
theology  included,  into  a  fresh  perspective.  We 
discover  that  there  is  a  biology  of  the  sects  as  well 


276         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

as  an  ecclesiology,  and  that  the  former  is  likely  to 
chase  the  latter  out  of  the  field.  In  this  view  the 
differences  which  have  exasperated  theology  and 
lit  its  persecuting  fires  are  seen  to  be  nature's 
effort  after  variety  and  individuality.  She  flatly 
refused,  at  Church  or  any  other  bidding,  to  be 
shut  up  to  one  type  or  species  of  religious  man. 
She  went  out  of  her  way  to  produce  fresh  specimens 
and  to  secure  their  perpetuation.  We  are  beginning 
now  to  see  the  futility  of  crossing  her  great  design. 
We  no  longer  propose  to  stay  the  ocean  with  the  mop 
of  Mrs.  Partington. 

The  religious  union  of  the  future — it  all  comes  to 
this — will  have  to  recognise  to  the  full  the  rights  of 
individual  liberty  and  development,  including  the 
right  of  difference.  Spiritual  association  will  be  a 
fellowship  of  faith,  love  and  service.  But  the  faith 
will  be  an  instinct  rather  than  a  definition.  /Its  in- 
quisition will  be  a  judgment  faculty  in  the  ulterior 
of  each  man's  soul,  not  an  institution  for  the  ex- 
communication of  his  brother  man.  Its  union 
will  be  for  help  and  cheer,  not  for  coercion  and 
bondagej>  It  will  include  all  who  seek  truth  and 
yearn  for  goodness.  Its  forces  will  be  precisely 
those  which  filled  the  first  disciples — the  forces  of  a 
great  love  and  an  immortal  hope.  This  union, 
in  its  largeness  and  freedom,  will  not  impoverish 
theology.  It  will  enrich  it.  Precisely  as  our  in- 
struments of  observation  and  of  measurement 
become  more  penetrating  and  more  accurate,  will 
be  the  range  of  the  spiritual  realm  they  discover, 
and  the  quantity  and  value  of  the  products  they 
draw  from  it.  With  the  higher  life  of  this 


OF  RELIGIOUS  UNION  277 

society  will  come  the  forms  which  best  express 
it.  Its  level  will  be  the  high-water  mark  of 
humanity,  its  growth  the  highest  human  pro- 
gress. And  the  relation  of  each  to  all  in  it  will 
be  that  of  the  noble  apostolic  word  :  "  Not  as 
having  dominion  over  your  faith,  but  as  helpers 
of  your  joy." 


XXXI 

Of  Inner    Discipline 

THE  Lenten  discipline  which,  through  long  centuries, 
has  been  recognised  in  the  Roman  and  allied  Churches 
reaches  its  height  in  the  days  that  immediately 
precede  the  anniversary  of  the  Passion.  In  what 
may  be  called  the  inner  circles  of  devotion — in 
monasteries,  in  sisterhoods,  amongst  the  clergy — 
we  hear  of  fastings,  of  penances,  of  vigils,  carried 
often  to  the  utmost  verge  of  physical  and  mental 
endurance.  At  the  spectacle  thus  presented  the 
outside  world  looks  on  with  a  mixed  feeling.  The 
mind  of  the  age,  working  with  a  freedom  unknown  to 
earlier  times,  is  observing  this  side  of  religion  from 
a  new  standpoint.  It  is  by  no  means  unsympa- 
thetic. It  believes  in  inner  discipline,  realising 
its  immense  import  for  life.  But  it  demands  a 
basis  for  it  which  shall  be  more  than  traditional 
— which  shall  also  be  rational.  It  will,  one  may 
hope,  be  helpful  if  we  look  now  a  little  into  this 
subject,  as  it  opens  in  the  light  of  the  modern 
consciousness. 

The  world,  we  say,  knows  this  theme  as  a  great 
one.  Indeed,  incomparably  the  greatest  of  all 
man's  histories  is  the  history  of  his  fight  with 

?78 


OF  INNER  DISCIPLINE  279 

himself.  Amiel  speaks  of  our  chief  function  in 
life  as  that  of  tamers  of  wild  beasts.  Plato,  ages 
before,  had  said  the  same  thing.  We  remember 
the  vivid  passage  in  the  "  Republic  "  where  he 
describes  that  "  wild  beast  in  our  nature  which, 
gorged  with  meat  and  drink,  starts  up  and  leaps 
about  and  seeks  to  satisfy  his  desires,  under  whose 
power  there  is  no  conceivable  folly  or  crime,  how- 
ever shameless  or  unnatural,  of  which  a  man  may 
not  believe  himself  capable."  A" Continental  philo- 
sophy of  our  day,  conceived  apparently  on  the 
principle  of  running  amok  among  all  the  deepest 
experiences  of  the  race,  has  ridiculed  this  whole 
business  of  interior  taming  and  subduing.  Accord- 
ing to  Nietzsche,  man's  prime  blunder  has  been  the 
fight  against  his  animalism.  It  is  an  infinite  pity 
that  he  ever  thought  of  turning  the  forces  which 
aforetime  he  used  for  war,  capture  and  sensual 
gratification,  in  upon  himself  for  an  unnatural 
campaign  against  the  primal  desires  and  passions. 
Nietzsche  will  have  no  terms  with  "  this  secret 
self- violation,  this  burning  into  oneself  a  criticism, 
an  opposition,  a  contempt,  a  *  No ' ;  this  dismal 
work  of  a  voluntarily  divided  soul  which  because  it 
delights  to  make  suffer,  makes  itself  suffer."  Paul, 
the  apostle  of  inwardness,  is  to  him  "  the  much 
tortured,  the  much  to  be  pitied  man,"  for  whom 
he  has  no  good  word.  This  kind  of  talk  has  had  its 
vogue  in  circles  which  pride  themselves  on  "  origi- 
nality in  morals."  But  it  is  shallow  enough. 
The  verdict  of  humanity  is  against  it.  The  human 
evolution  has  made  no  such  blunder  as  is  here  sug- 
gested. Man,  on  his  way  to  be  super-man,  on  his 


280        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

way  from  brutal  to  spiritual,  could  travel  by  no 
other  route  than  this.  The  "  internalisation," 
the  turning  of  life's  fight  inward,  against  which  our 
philosopher  exclaims,  is  the  fact  which,  above 
all  others,  suggests  at  once  the  greatness  and  the 
uniqueness  of  man's  destiny. 

This  is  not  to  say  that  in  the  details  of  the  process 
there  have  not  been  mistakes  and  perversions. 
There  has  been  enough  of  them.  It  is,  indeed, 
precisely  upon  this  point  that  the  saner  criticism 
of  to-day  is  turning  itself.  It  would  fain  sift 
out,  from  the  confused  jumble  of  theory  and  experi- 
ence which  the  past  has  bequeathed  to  us,  the  good 
from  the  bad,  the  elements  that  make  for  the 
proper  conduct  of  life  from  those  which  are  only 
the  deposits  of  ignorance  and  misunderstanding. 
We  have  reached  here  some  principles  which  earlier 
times  failed  to  discern.  We  have  ceased,  for 
instance,  to  believe  in  asceticism  ;  in  privation  and 
starvation  for  their  own  sake.  We  find  no  inherent 
virtue  in  privation.  The  notion  of  shutting  the 
eye  to  the  world's  beauty,  of  banning  the  develop- 
ment of  its  inner  wealth,  is  to  us  a  barbarism. 
When  St.  Bernard,  writing  to  Abbot  William 
against  ornaments  in  churches,  says  :  "  We  monks 
who  have  reputed  as  filth  all  that  shines  bright, 
or  sounds  sweet  to  the  ear,  what  fruit  do  we  expect 
from  such  things  ?  "  we  regard  his  mental  condition 
as,  in  this  respect,  a  pitiable  one.  Sir  Thomas 
More,  Catholic  though  he  was,  gives  the  coup  de 
grace  to  asceticism  in  that  fine  passage  of  the 
"  Utopia  "  where  he  argues  that,  if  a  joyful  life  is  in 
itself  an  evil,  then  we  ought  to  refrain  from  all 


OP  INNER  DISCIPLINE  281 

that  increases  the  joy  of  others.  But  if  it  is  a 
good  to  others,  then  it  must  be  good  for  our- 
selves. 

These  legacies  of  the  past  in  the  matter  of  inner 
discipline  contain  indeed  a  vast  amount  of  rubbish 
which  it  were  well  to  have  incontinently  swept 
away.  In  this  category  comes  the  monkish  notion 
of  a  whole  fraternity  being  drilled  and  patterned 
upon  one  minutely  detailed  scheme  of  living.  The 
endeavour  to  make  men  by  machinery  can  have 
only  one  result — that  of  making  them  machines. 
Ecclesiasticism,  in  striving  for  uniformity,  is  going 
clean  contrary  to  Nature's  whole  way  of  develop- 
ment, which  is  rather  to  create  variety  and 
spontaneity.  The  allied  notion  of  monkery,  of 
crushing  the  individual  will  and  reducing  all 
to  one  level  of  passive  obedience,  is  another  of  the 
deadly  cosmic  heresies.  What  is  wanted  in  the 
individual  is  not  less  will,  but  more  and  ever  more 
of  it. /There  is  no  character  in  subjection.  It  is 
in  vofition,  the  subtlest,  mightiest,  most  wonderful 
thing  in  the  universe,  in  the  fullest,  freest,  most 
reasoned  exercise  of  it,  that  man's  value  really 
consists. /It  is  to  an  ill-instructed  past  also  we 
owe  the  religion  of  solemnity  and  severity,  as 
though  these  in  themselves  were  of  the  essence  of 
virtue  and  holiness.  In  a  period  when  the  world 
was  conceived  to  be  under  a  terrorism ;  when 
cruelty  was  deified  ;  when  men,  with  Tertullian 
and  Aquinas,  could  picture  the  sufferings  of  tortured 
souls  as  adding  to  the  pleasures  of  heaven,  such 
a  view  was  consistent  enough.  But  we  are  emerg- 
ing from  this  darkness.  We  are  asking  about  the 


282        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

theologic  significance  of  laughter  as  well  as  of  tears. 
And  by  aid  of  this  better  conception  we  are  depriv- 
ing gloom  and  sourness  of  their  ancient  religious 
vogue.  We  are  with  La  Rochefoucauld  in  defining 
the  gravity  of  certain  people  as  "  un  mystere  du 
corps,  invents  pour  cacher  les  defauts  de  V  esprit" 

But  the  modern  consciousness,  in  shaking  itself 
loose  from  ideas  of  this  kind,  is,  we  have  said,  not 
less  emphatic  than  was  antiquity  about  the  necessity 
of  an  inner  discipline.  But  observe  the  difference 
of  outlook !  Not  from  the  terror  of  vengeful 
powers,  not  from  a  despairing  sense  of  the  essential 
evil  of  the  world  ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  from  a  feel- 
ing of  the  entire  good  of  things,  of  the  glorious 
possibilities  of  life,  of  the  limitless  destinies  of  the 
human  spirit,  do  we  to-day  find  our  reason  for 
inward  government,  for  the  daily  drill  and  regimen 
of  the  soul.  Religion  and  science  are  one  in  recog- 
nising that  the  goal  to  be  aimed  at,  the  principle 
which  is  to  give  law  to  conduct,  is  the  fulness  and 
furtherance  of  life.  And  for  this  fulness  and 
furtherance  we  perceive  that  the  upper  must  ever 
govern  the  lower.  The  body  in  its  very  con- 
figuration is  here  the  image  of  the  mind.  The 
head  towers  above  the  stomach,  the  upper  nerve- 
centres  control  the  reflex  action  of  the  lower  and 
local  ones.  The  body  here  is,  we  say,  the  soul's 
parable.  And  thoughtful  men,  of  every  shade  of 
theologic  and  anti-theologic  thinking,  perceive 
the  fact.  Maeterlinck,  occupying  the  extremest 
left  of  the  sceptical  movement,  insists  with  the 
most  orthodox  that  "  sterile  pleasures  of  the  body 
must  be  sacrificed ;  all  that  is  not  in  absolute 


OP  INNER  DISCIPLINE  283 

harmony  with  a  larger,  more  durable  energy  of 
thought."  He  insists  on  a  reform  of  our  eating  and 
drinking  as  a  necessity  of  spiritual  advance.  And 
assuredly  not  without  reason.  In  one  department 
here  we  have  made,  it  is  true,  a  great  move  forward 
upon  the  habits  of  our  fathers.  What  a  condition 
of  things  do  records  like  the  Greville  Memoirs 
and  the  Creevey  Papers  reveal  in  the  early  nineteenth 
century,  and  that  amongst  the  most  eminent 
public  men  !  "  Lord  Grey  came  in  drunk  from 
the  Duke  of  York's,  where  he  had  been  dining." 
* '  Old  Sidmouth  was  never  sober."  Brougham, 
speaking  in  the  House  of  Commons  hi  1827,  "  was 
so  very  tipsy  that  for  some  time  he  did  not  know 
what  he  said."  Lamb's  half -humorous,  half -bitter, 

"  D n  temperance  and  he  that  first  invented  it 

— some  anti-Noahite  !  "  represents  pretty  much  the 
feeling  of  the  time.  We  are  a  clear  step  beyond  that. 
But  what  of  our  eating  ?  The  fare  offered  you  at  a 
modern  hotel  for  breakfast,  luncheon  and  dinner 
represents  the  average  feeding  of  comfortable 
Society  ;  and  in  flesh  food  alone,  as  science  is  now 
loudly  telling  us,  the  menu  contains  three  times 
more  than  we  have  any  business  to  swallow.  When 
shall  we  attain  to  an  hotel  that  will  feed  us  rationally  ? 
Here  is  a  reform  for  which  we  must  look,  not  to  the 
House  of  Commons,  but  to  a  clearer  knowledge 
amongst  men,  and  rich  men  especially,  of  the 
essential  laws  of  life. 

In  connection  with  bodily  habit,  as  related  to 
inner  discipline,  a  cardinal  principle  should  be  the 
maintenance  and  daily  assertion  of  the  supremacy 
pf  the  instructed  will  over  all  custom  and  usage. 


284        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

It  is  well  to  try  a  fall  with  our  habits  now  and  then, 
if  only  to  see  how  we  stand  to  them.  When  the 
smoker  is  reduced  to  despair  by  a  week's  deprivation 
of  tobacco,  it  is  time  for  him  to  give  up  his  pipe.  If 
our  faith  in  God  and  man  depends  on  so  many 
hours  in  bed,  it  were  well  to  straightway  revise 
our  time-table.  Whether  the  Chinese  in  South 
Africa  are  slaves  or  not  may  be  a  moot  point,  but 
there  is  no  doubt  there  are  abundance  of  slaves } 
well-to-do  and  well-fed,  in  England,  and  it  is 
time  they  shook  off  their  chains.  At  all  costs  let  us 
carry  in  us  a  free  and  independent  soul. 

Thus  of  the  outer,  but  there  is  also  the  inner. 
That  is  an  admirable  definition  of  fasting  which 
Clement  of  Alexandria  gives  us  in  the  "  Stromata  "  : 
"  Now  fastings  signify  abstinence  from  all  evils 
whatsoever,  both  in  action  and  in  word,  and  in 
thought  itself."  "  In  thought  itself  !"  Our  religion 
has  done  nothing  for  us  unless  it  has  given  us  an 
easy  control  here.  It  is  in  this  realm,  indeed, 
that  its  whole  triumph  lies.  Its  grandest  product  is 
the  entire  and  joyful  acquiescence  in  whatsoever 
befalls  us.  The  notion  of  religion  as  an  assurance 
against  calamities  is  too  na'ive.  It  is  rather  a 
preparation  for  them  and  a  state  of  soul  for  meeting 
them.  Circumstance  may  play  its  worst  trick 
upon  us  ;  it  may  reduce  us  in  a  moment  from 
wealth  to  poverty,  from  strength  and  activity  to 
the  extremity  of  weakness.  The  soul,  disciplined 
by  faith,  will  meet  that  extremity  and  not  be  cowed 
by  it.  It  will  realise  with  Vauvenargues  that 
"  despair  is  the  worst  of  our  errors."  Its  whole 
development  will  have  taught  it  to  accept  life, 


OF  INNER  DISCIPLINE  285 

in  whatsoever  strange  and  repelling  form  it  for  the 
moment  offers  itself,  as  a  present  good  and  the 
promise  of  an  infinite  better.  It  is  a  great  thing 
to  be  taught  our  utter  nothingness.  After  we 
have  tasted  that  sensation  we  are  ready  for  what 
generally  comes  next,  the  sense  of  the  Divine 
sufficiency.  We  rest  in  a  system  of  things  which 
is  too  vast  for  our  comprehension,  but  which  we  feel 
to  be  good.  We  know  ourselves  as  in  an  orderly 
universe  with  Infinite  Perfection  at  its  centre. 

It  is  by  such  inner  discipline,  and  by  no  other 
process,  that  we  arrive  at  the  perception  of  the 
higher  truths.  Good  comes  first,  truth  afterwards. 
Les  grandes  pensees  viennent  du  cosur.  The 
heart  knows  truths  which  the  reason  cannot 
formulate.  We  require  a  certain  inner  height  to 
discern  life's  greatest  secret.  It  is  given  alone  to 
the  pure  in  heart  to  see  God. 


XXXII 
On   Being  Worldly 

ST.  JOHN'S  text,  "  Love  not  the  world,"  is  one  of 
those  master  words  which  are  at  once  an  interpreta- 
tion of  life  and  a  direction  of  it.  That  such  a 
word  should  ever  have  been  uttered  by  a  man  to 
men  is  in  itself  a  portent.  It  reveals  humanity 
as  something  greater,  stranger,  than  the  wisest  of 
us  can  understand.  The  appeal  is  to  something 
beyond  the  senses,  beyond  the  cold  reason.  The 
soul  in  its  inmost  depths  recognises  the  word  as  a 
true  one,  answering  to  something  essential  to  its 
own  life  and  progress.  That  it  was  uttered,  and 

I  with  such  prodigious  effect,  is  only  intelligible  on  the 
supposition  that  man  is,  as  Lamennais  puts  it, 
"  torn  asunder  between  two  worlds  .  .  .  that 

\  he  has  one  foot  in  the  finite  and  the  other  in  the 
infinite."  It  is  in  proportion  as  men  are  cultivated, 
as  they  understand  life,  as  they  live  it  to  the  broadest 
and  fullest,  that  they  catch  the  apostolic  meaning 
here,  and  give  to  its  injunction  their  fullest  weight 
of  endorsement. 

It  takes,  we  say,  a  highly-developed  nature  to 
catch  the  real  flavour  of  this  utterance.  That  is 
the  reason  why  raw  and  untrained  minds  have  made 

286 


ON  BEING  WORLDLY  287 

such  ludicrous  travesties  of  it.  In  the_entire  wide 
region  of  religious  aberration  there  is  no  more 
curious  spectacle  than  the  fantasies  which  the 
rendering  of  this  text  has  produced.  Men  have 
fled  from  worldliness,  banned  it,  exorcised  it, 
without  stopping  to  ask  first  what  worldliness 
means.  They  have  abandoned  cities  and  dwelt  in 
the  wilderness  under  the  notion  that  they  were 
escaping  the  world.  With  the  same  idea  people 
have  worn  uniforms,  eschewed  amusements,  drawn) 
a  line  between  themselves  and  outsiders,  abandoned , 
politics,  abandoned  business,  shut  themselves  up 
in  monasteries  and  nunneries,'  The  world  to  b 
shunned  was  to  them  the  world  of  average  human 
society  and  of  the  average  human  activity. 

Perhaps  the  oddest  phase  of  supposed  unworldli- 
ness — one  which  has  still  a  wide  enough  vogue — 
is  that  which  may  be  described  as  future-worldli- 
ness.  Its  condition  of  mind  is  one  of  desire  for  all 
the  good  things  going,  but  with  a  postponement 
of  their  enjoyment  to  a  later  date  and  another  sphere. 
We  see  this  disposition  in  full  swing  in  the  Jewish 
community  of  the  first  Christian  century.  Their 
national  hopes  were  at  zero.  Israel  was  oppressed 
under  a  foreign  yoke,  and  the  only  escape  from  a 
world  that  had  become  intolerable  seemed  to  lie 
in  a  supernatural  interposition  in  which  their 
promised  Messiah  should  appear,  overwhelming 
their  enemies,  and  securing  to  them  the  power 
and  splendour  for  which  they  thirsted.  We  have 
here  the  origin  of  that  voluminous  apocalyptic 
literature  with  which  the  time  abounded.  This 
spirit  has  lingered  into  our  own  days.  There  are 


288        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

people  who,  Bible  in  hand,  declare  the  world  a 
bad  world,  close  to  a  bad  end.  They  anticipate 
a  catastrophe  for  most  of  us,  and  a  reign  of  splendour 
for  the  saints.  Their  heaven  is  as  material  a  one 
as  Park  Lane,  the  only  difference  being  one  of 
time  and  place.  The  habit  of  mind  here — of  keeping 
aloof  from  the  visible  prosperities  of  to-day  in 
anticipation  of  bigger  ones  of  the  same  order 
to-morrow — reminds  one  of  nothing  so  much  as 
of  a  Temperance  association  reported  of  amongst 
some  Northern  miners,  who  practised  total  abstin- 
ence for  a  certain  period  in  order  with  the  money 
thus  saved  to  have  a  sustained  orgie  later  on/ 
/"  The  notion  of  worldliness,  or  its  opposite,  as 
having  anything  to  do  with  time  or  place  is  a 
primitive  one,  outgrown  by  all  but  primitive  minds. 
Eternity,  with  all  that  belongs  to  it,  is  now  if  ever. 
Cataclysms  and  so-called  world-endings  have  nothing 
to  do  with  morality.  And  the  material  world  is 
not  likely  to  end  yet.  Modern  science,  which  traces 
the  history  of  our  planetary  system  back  through 
immeasurable  aeons  to  the  time  when  it  was  a 
nebula,  a  fiery  mist — and  forward  through  uncounted 
millions  of  years  to  the  time  when  the  dead  sun  and 
planets  will  become  a  nebula  again — gives  us  an 
outlook  which  differs  considerably  from  these 
naive  Jewish  conceptions./  The  spiritual  life  belongs 
to  another  sphere  from  that  of  big  happenings, 
stunning  to  the  senses,  and  of  dates  in  the  almanac.  > 
What,  then,  is  it  to  be  worldly  ?  It  assuredly 
does  not  mean  loving  the  world  we  open  our  eyes 
on  of  a  morning.  If  that  were  worldliness,  then 
Jesus  was  the  greatest  of  worldlings.  How  He  loved 


ON  BEING  WORLDLY.  289 

this  world !  Never^  in  any  human  soul  did  its 
beauty  strike  a  deeper  chord.  The  deep  blue  sky 
of  Galilee,  the  flowers  by  its  lake,  the  gambols  of 
the  children,  the  homely  business,  the  simple 
social  intercourse  of  the  countryside — all  this 
mirrored  itself  on  that  clear  spiritual  surface  as 
an  image  of  delight.  It  was  the  Father's  world, 
and  it  was  good.  Assuredly  the  man  who  talks 
pessimism  is  not  thereby  proclaiming  himself  un- 
worldly. Voltaire's,  "  Apres  tout  c'est  un  monde 
passable"  and  Lamb's  "  I  assure  you  I  find  this 
world  a  very  pretty  place,"  are  good,  honest 
utterances.  The  man  who  can  find  no  good  in  this 
world  is  not  likely  to  find  it  in  any  other. 

The  real  worldliness,  that  against  which  the 
apostolic  word  and  all  the  soul's  highest  instincts 
warn  us,  is  that  of /a^disposition  without  faith  and 
without  love.  It  is  the  absence,  or  the  fatal  over- 
laying, of  the  spiritual  instinct.  The  great  scientist 
Pasteur,  in  a  striking  passage,  speaks  of  the  double  / 
mail  in  Us,  the  one  taking  note  of  all  that  appeals/" 
to  the  senses,  and  the  other  feeling  an  appeal 
from  something,  somewhere  beyond  sense,  and* 
vibrating  in  response  to  that  mystic  note,/  All 
the  best  minds  of  humanity  have  felt  that  appeal. 
It  is  repeated  by  the  Indian  sages,  by  the  great 
Greek  teachers,  most  impressively  of  all  by  the 
Christian  Gospel.  When  Plato  in  the  "  Phaedo  " 
and  in  the  "  Gorgias  "  declares  for  a  world  of 
divine  ideas,  beyond  sense,  in  which  is  the  one 
Reality,  and  where  the  soul  finds  its  home,  he 
forecasts  the  result  of  the  best  science  and  philosophy 
of  our  time.  Modern  metaphysic  by  a  pitiless 

19 


290         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

analysis  has  shattered  every  supposition  of  material- 
ism, and  shown  us  that  if  there  be  a  Reality  it  lies 
not  there.  The  latest  science  echoes  that  word. 
To  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  life  appears  "  as  something 
whose  full  significance  lies  in  another  scheme  of 
things."  Science  is  thus  leading  to  something 
beyond  science  as  alone  supplying  the  solution  of 
the  world's  riddle. 

The  unworldly  man,  then,  is  he  who,  by  whatsoever 
path  he  has  reached  it,  has  arrived  at  a  full  sense 
and  conviction  of  this  invisible  scheme,  this  spiritual 
,  order  of  the  universe.  /The  highest  intuitions  of 
his  nature,  the  voices  within  that  speak  of  love, 
duty,  purity,  sacrifice  as  the  absolutely  vital  things, 
are  by  him  accepted  as  the  final  authority.  To 
obey  these  voices  is  to  be  religious,  to  disobey  them 
is  to  be  infidel.  Every  heroic  life  is  built  on  these 
suppositions  y/Wherever  you  see  a  man  taking 
his  life  in  his  hands  at  the  call  of  duty,  stripping 
himself  of  present  ease  or  goods  that  he  may  serve 
his  neighbour,  you  see  a  believer,  whatever  the  name 
he  calls  himself.  Such  a  man  does  not  despise  the 
visible.  Why  should  he  ?  It  is  God's  artistry. 
The  beauty  of  sound,  of  sight,  of  odour  is  treasure 
poured  out  of  God's  soul.  But  the  beauty  of  the 
visible  has  its  chief  appeal  to  him  as  an  image  and 
emblem  of  a  diviner  beauty  still,  which  not  eye 
hath  seen  nor  ear  heard./ 

By  this  standard  we  can  measure  the  worldlings. 
There  are  people  who  have  absolutely  no  sense  of 
all  this.  So  far  as  we  can  see  they  are  born  without 
it.  It  is  like  being  without  _an-ear  for  music.  They 
are  in  all  classes,  and  some  of  them  are  highly 


7 


ON  BEING  WORLDLY  291 

educated.  You  may  meet  them  in  social  inter- 
course for  years,  and  amidst  all  their  sayings, 
witty,  sparkling,  full  of  knowledge  of  the  world, 
you  shall  never,  by  any  chaoce,  catch  an  inspiring 
utterance,  a  word  that  expresses  remotest  suspicion 
of  aught  higher,  better  than  they  see.  It  is  not 
in  them,  and  you  cannot  get  blood  out  of  a  post. 
All  one  can  say  is  that,  as  related  to  the  highest 
development,  they  are  sub-human.  Poor  creatures  ! 
God  suffers  them,  and  therefore  we  must. 

By  the  side  of  this  race  of  the  sniritu^ycolour- 
blind,  we  find  a  great  class  of  the  dun -sigEted ; 
or  perhaps,  shall  we  say,  of  the  near-sighted.  Their 
retina  receives  a  very  clear  vision  of  the  world 
they  touch,  but  only  confused  and  feeble  rays 
from  the  other.  Duty  means  something  to  them, 
but  interest  so  much  more.  And  so  their  aims, 
instead  of  curving  upward  till  they  meet  in  God, 
curve  downward  to  find  their  end  in  self.  A  Seneca, 
whom  Carlyle  describes  as  "  the  father  of  all  such 
as  wear  shovel  hats,"  trying  at  the  same  tune 
to  stand  well  with  truth  and  with  Nero,  is  their 
type  among  philosophers.  He  certainly  was  of 
the  race  represented  by  the  philosopher,  who,! 
when  asked  by  his  king  "  why  sages  were  seen 
at  the  doors  of  kings,  but  not  kings  at  the, 
doors  of  sages,"  replied,  "  Because  sages  knew  what 
was  good  for  them  and  kings  did  not."  Of  all 
worldlings  of  this  species  the  ecclesiastical  worldling 
is  the  strangest  and  most  sinister  specimen.  It  is 
the  singular  danger  of  professional  religion  that 
it  tends  to  atrophy  the  very  instincts  which  it  is 
set  apart  to  serve.  The  ecclesiastic  studies  human 


192         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

nature  until  the  temptation  comes  to  him  to  study 
its  weak  points,  its  errors,  its  credulities,  in  order 
to  profit  by  them.  To  use  spiritual  means  for  the 
promotion  of  personal  ends  is  the  damnable  infidelity 
to  which  the  devil  draws  him.  It  is  thus  that  the 
worldly-minded  ecclesiastic  becomes  the  most 
dangerous  of  men.  When  faith  dies  in  a  nation  it 
•s  the  Churchman  who  kills  it.  France  to-day  is 

j  in  search  of  a  religion.  Her  succession  of  ecclesi- 
astical rulers  and  politicians — a  Richelieu,  a  Mazarin, 

S  a  Talleyrand — succeeded  to-day  by  the  priests  who 
engineered  the  Dreyfus  business,  have  nearly  finished 
the  old  one. 

Modern  society  in  all  departments  of  its  life  can 
only  be  saved  by  its  unworldly  men.  We  want 
politicians  and  statesmen  of  this  breed.  Plato's 
cry  for  philosophers  as  State  rulers  meant  that  the 
only  men  for  such  posts  were  such  as  were  rooted 

/in  the  Eternal.  Happily  there  were  and  are  such. 
Oeighton's  remark  about  Hildebrand's  monk- 
popes,  who  ruled  the  world  while  renouncing  it, 
suggests  the  high  road  here.  A  man  may  be  in 
the  foremost  place  and  keep  the  heart  of  a  child. 
He  will  keep  it  by  abiding  in  God,  ready  to  rule  or  to 
serve,  to  be  at  top  or  bottom  if  only  it  be  His  will. 
At  present  politics  are  an  ugly  scramble,  and  Church 
life  is  little  better.  When  Lord  Grey  resigned  in 
1834  he  told  Creevey  that  he  had  300  applications 
for  peerages  and  a  perfectly  endless  number  for 
baronetcies ./Tn  the  Church,  of  all  denominations, 
the  rush  for  front  places  is  just  as  fierce  and  as 
ruthless.  JVten  will  talk  angelically  on  a  public 
platforHl  about  humility  and  self-renunciation,  their 


ON  BEING  WORLDLY  293 

chief  thought  being  meanwhile  to  get  their  name 
advertised  and  their  address  published.     The  spiri- 
tual education,  both  of  the  world  and  of  the  Church, „ 
is  as  yet  clearly  only  at  its  beginning.    We  see  our) 
nobler,  inner  world  but  dimly,  "  as  through  a  glassf 
darkly."    We  need  all  of  us  to  get  our  vision  purged.) 
The  reform  of  the  soul  is  a  more  urgent  need  than 
the  reform  of  Parliament.    When  we  are  at  last 
fairly  in  love  with  that  highest  world — the  world 
opened  to  us  in  the  New  Testament,  which  Jesus 
lived  in,  and  where  all  the  noblest  aspirations  have 
their  springs — we  shall  be  fit  for  whatever  post  or 
work  is  assigned  us,  and  carry  a  clean  soul  through 
it  all. 


XXXIII 
Of  Self-Creation 

'  You  are  a  poem,  though  your  poem's  naught," 
cries  Browning  in  one  of  his  verses.  We  might  go 
further  and  say  of  every  man  that  he  is  not  only 
poem  but  poet.  He  is  so  in  the  old  Greek  sense, 
where  the  word  "  poet  "  stands  first  of  all  for  the 
doer,  the  maker.  That  is  man's  title  on  this  planet, 
the  maker — one  might  in  a  sense  say,  the  creator. 
The  animals,  in  their  countless  generations,  leave 
the  world  very  much  as  they  find  it.  But  this 
other  animal,  on  his  way  through,  shapes  a  thousand 
monuments  of  himself.  He  breathes  his  thought 
upon  wood  and  stone  and  iron,  and  they  stand 
henceforth  as  forms  of  his  imagination.  He  flings 
his  will  outward,  and  it  cuts  its  way  through  moun- 
tain and  forest,  making  a  new  thing  of  the  ancient 
earth.  He  weds  the  invisibles  of  his  soul  to  the 
solid  material  he  finds  without,  by  processes  which 
become  ever  more  complicated,  ever  more  daring, 
until  the  prospect  opens  of  his  bringing  into  sub- 
jection every  element,  every  cosmic  force.  Indeed 
is  he  the  poet,  the  "  maker." 

But  all  this  mastery  outside  is  but  a  small  jfcirt 
of    man's  creative  function.     Its  most  wonderful 

294 


OF  SELF-CREATION  295 

feature  is  exhibited  in  the  action  of  it  upon  himself. 
To  make  railways  and  steam-engines  and  ships  and 
palaces  is  no  small  thing.  £But  all  this  becomes 
insignificant  in  comparison  with  another  work  on 
which  he  is  engaged — that  of  remaking  himself. 
Man  has  to-day  a  competitor  who  will  in  the  end 
beat  him  out  of  the  field.J  It  is  that  other  man, 
the  man  that  is  to  be,  whom  he  is  creating.  Man 
is  king  now  over  all  he  sees,  but  he  works  incessantly 
for  his  own  deposition.  As  surely  as  the  child  dies 
into  the  man,  so  surely  will  our  present  manhood 
die  into  a  better.  Of  all  his  cunning  processes, 
the  magic  of  his  looms,  of  his  retorts,  this  is  the 
crowning  work,  incessantly,  silently  going  on,  the 
weaving,  to  wit,  of  new  brain  and  heart,  the  sketch- 
ing of  a  vaster  human  structure  of  which  future  ages 
will  witness  the  great  completion. 

Our  business,  however,  in  the  present  article  is  not 
with  the  age-long  movement  of  our  race  as  a  whole. 
We  are  contributing  to  that,  but  in  the  meantime 
there  is  a  business  closer  home.  It  is  that  of  the 
creation  of  ourselves  as  individuals.  The  world 
process  is  being  repeated  in  you  and  me.  In  our 
several  callings  we  are  making  a  thousand  thjngs — 
boots,  buildings,  leading  articles,  what  not.  ^Beyond 
that  we  are  at  this  moment,  as  in  every  past  moment, 
engaged  in  the  work  of  making  ourselves./  There 
is,  we  are  aware,  a  modern  school  that  denies  this, 
and  holds  that  what  goes  on  within  us  is  as  mechanical 
and  inevitable  as  the  revolution  of  the  planet  or 
the  wash  of  the  wave  on  the  shore.  Physiologists, 
like  Bichat,  argue  that  character  is  unchangeable, 
depending  on  the  organic  structure  and  functions. 


296         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

To  which  it  is  enough  for  us  to  reply,  with  Dr. 
Johnson,  "  all  theory  is  against  the  freedom  of  the 
will,  all  experience  for  it."  The  logic  of  life  is 
deeper  than  the  logic  of  the  schools,  and  we  have  only 
to  examine  what  passes  in  our  own  interior  to 
realise  the  immense  extent  to  which  we  have  been 
put  in  trust  with  this  business.  It  is  not  what  I 
am  but  what  I  can  be,  not  the  actual  but  the  im- 
mense possible,  that  gives  life  its  finest  inspiration. 
.Let  us  examine  the  ground  a  little  here. 

There  are  two  factors  that  are  incessantly  weav- 
ing man  ;  the  one  is  his  faculty  of  reception,  the 
other  his  volition.  As  to  the  former,  one  notes  a 
i  striking  recent  suggestion  of  Sir  Oliver  Lodge : 
v*  That  the  whole  of  us  may  not  be  incarnated  in  our 
present  selves.  What  the  rest  of  me  may  be  doing 
for  these  few  years  while  I  am  here  I  do  not  know  ; 
perhaps  it  is  asleep."  It  might,  we  think,  be  put 
more  simply  and  yet  more  impressively  than  that. 
Is  it  not  that  the  whole  universe  is  the  unincar- 
nated  part  of  us  ?  We  are  related  to  it  all,  and 
have  incessant  commerce  with  all  its  parts.  The 
light  from  its  farthest  star  falls  on  our  retina,  the 
forces  that  move  Sinus  work  on  our  nerves.  So  far 
as  we  can  see  there  are  none  of  its  resources  we  may 
not  absorb,  none  of  its  wealth  by  which  we  may 
not  enrich  ourselves.  We  are  the  meeting-point 
of  the  Cosmos,  the  playground  of  its  forces,  the 
clearing-house  of  its  treasure.  Year  by  year, 
century  by  century,  man  is  becoming  immeasur- 
ably mightier  by  his  growing  intimacy  with  his 
universe. 

The  other   factor  in  man's   self -creation  is,   we 


1      ^  OF  SELF-CREATION  297 

have  said,  his  power  of  volition.  The  question 
of  the  will  has,  in  latter-day  philosophy,  been 
thrown  into  some  strangely  new  aspects.  Schopen- 
hauer, in  his  "  Welt  als  Wille  und  Vorstellung," 
gives  us  will  as  something  before  intellect,  before 
consciousness,  as  the  prime  motor  of  the  universe,  the 
ultimate  cause.  It  is  not  necessary  to  follow  the 
German  philosopher  into  these  conclusions  to  esti- 
mate to  the  full  the  tremendous  power  of  the 
faculty  which,  under  the  name  of  the  will,  we  find 
lodged  within  us,  In  its  operations  we  see  creation 
if  we  see  it  anywhere.  The  roar  of  avalanches, 
the  rush  of  Niagaras,  are  not  to  compare,  in  the 
mystery  of  their  power,  with  the  silent  move- 
ment which  we  call  a  volition.  Niagara  could 
sweep  ten  thousand  men  down  its  gulf  without  feel- 
ing it ;  but  the  idea  beating  in  the  brain  of  one  of 
those  ten  thousand  may  suffice  to  chain  Niagara 
and  to  make  bond  slaves  of  its  powers. 

We  want,  however,  now  to  observe  the  action  of 
will  upon  character,  its  action  as  self-creator. 
What  takes  place  here  reminds  us  of  nothing  so 
much  as  that  play  of  radiant  matter  of  which  Sir 
William  Crookes  has  given  us  such  amazing  revela- 
tions. In  a  closed  tube,  where  almost  a  vacuum 
is  made  to  exist,  we  have  a  rush  of  invisible 
molecules  of  such  rapidity  and  force  that  a  mass 
of  metal  under  their  impact  becomes  red-hot,  and 
will  even  melt  if  the  attack  is  prolonged.  These 
molecules,  we  say,  so  minute  yet  so  mighty,  remind 
us  of  the  impact  upon  the  personality  of  those 
mysterious  will-impulses  which  in  a  strong  character, 
streaming  from  the  centre,  are  necessarily  working 


298         RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE,'  { 

upon  and  transforming  the  entire  moral  structure. 
Poor  are  we  indeed  in  inner  resource  if  we  have 
not  experienced  the  power  of  this  working. 

Take,  for  instance,  the  question  of  temperament. 
Is  it  possible  to  recreate  one's  temperament  ?  It 
is  easy  to  put  the  matter  to  proof.  There  are 
men  who  carry  in  them  a  tendency  to  melancholy. 
Poor  poet  Gray,  himself  a  victim,  has  described  it 
for  us.  "  But  there  is  another  sort,  black  indeed, 
that  has  something  in  it  like  Tertullian's  rule  of 
faith.  Credo  quid  impossibile  est.  For  it  believes, 
nay,  is  sure  of,  everything  that  is  unlikely,  so  it  be 
but  frightful ;  and  on  the  other  hand  excludes 
and  shuts  its  eyes  to  the  most  possible  hopes, 
and  everything  that  is  pleasureable."  But  the 
melancholy  man  has  his  remedy.  It  lies  in  the 
daily  energy  of  his  will.  When  the  black  thoughts 
come,  a  strong  volition,  like  a  breeze  from  the 
north,  will  sweep  away  the  clouds.  We  can  will 
the  thoughts  which  are  to  come  to  us,  the  memories 
on  which  to  feed,  the  prospects  for  the  mind  to 
gaze  upon.  Our  world  will  change  for  us  by  the 
constant  repetition  of  this  process.  The  mind  will 
act  here  as  the  body  acts.  When  we  first  learn  to 
walk  our  every  step  demands  a  separate  volition. 
After  the  process  has  been  kept  up  through  the  days 
and  weeks  the  action  that  required  these  studied 
efforts  becomes  automatic,  and  we  walk  easily 
without  thinking  about  it.  And  the  will  which 
does  this  for  the  body  will  do  it  also  for  the  mind. 
If  we  will  to  be  cheerful,  to  banish  the  unwhole- 
some fancies,  the  brooding  resentments,  the  sense 
of  slights  and  injuries,  and  instead  to  summon 


OF  SELF-CREATION  299 

to  our  thought  the  causes  of  gratitude,  the  sense  of 
the  good  in  life,  the  reasons  for  aspiration  and  hope, 
we  can  do  it.  The  lapses  from  all  this  may  be 
frequent,  as  an  infant's  falls  are  frequent ;  but 
let  us  after  each  stumble  pick  ourselves  up  and 
move  on,  and  in  time  the  joy-sense  will  become  a 
habit,  and  we  shall  wake  up  daily  in  clear  weather. 

It  is  in  this  way  that  men  create  their  world,  and 
make  a  good  one  or  a  bad  one  of  it,  apart  from  all 
considerations  of  external  fortune.  They  have 
made  it  by  making  themselves.  Seneca  observes 
of  Diogenes  that  "  he  kept  himself  outside  the 
fortuitous.  It  is  as  if  he  had  said,  '  Do  your 
business  fortune  :  you  have  nothing  to  do  with 
Diogenes.' '  Mr.  Moncure  Conway,  in  his  auto- 
biography, speaks  of  a  negro  woman  he  knew  in 
his  youth  as  the  happiest  person  he  ever  met. 
"  Her  quick  intelligence,  her  humour,  her  humility 
and  simplicity,  and  indefinable  qualities  that  I  never 
knew  in  any  white  person  made  her  to  me  a  reve- 
lation." Here  was  happiness  achieved  against 
perhaps  the  heaviest  handicap  that  modern  life 
offers.  The  powerlessness  of  fortune  as  compared 
with  will  in  the  making  of  character  is  vividly 
illustrated  in  the  case  of  the  two  great  moralists 
Vauvenargues  and  La  Rochefoucauld.  Of  the  two 
a  French  critic  observes :  "  La  Rochefoucauld, 
born  into  the  first  rank,  dowered  with  great  fortune, 
loved  with  the  most  passionate  love  in  his  youth, 
surrounded  by  illustrious  and  exquisite  friendship 
in  old  age,  overwhelmed  as  it  seemed  with  all 
fortune's  favours,  brings  from  the  voyage  of  life 
only  a  bitter  experience,  and  from  the  spectacle 


300        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

of  humanity  a  disdainful  pessimism.  Vauvenargues, 
on  the  contrary,  poor,  always  suffering,  unfortunate 
in  all  his  enterprises,  preserves  the  serenity  of  his 
soul  and  the  equity  of  his  judgment,  proclaiming 
man's  capacity  of  goodness,  disinterestedness  and 
love."  We  repeat,  the  will  is  omnipotent  in  this 
sphere  if  we  will  only  use  it.  We  may  not,  perhaps, 
achieve  wealth  or  empire.  But  if  we  do  not  reach 
this  brightness  of  inner  temper  the  fault  is  not 
God's  or  the  world's  ;  it  is  our  own. 

But  self-creation  does  not  end  here.  It  extends 
not  only  over  temperament,  but  also  over  the 
whole  of  our  mental  life.  Our  mind  at  the  begin- 
ning is  an  acorn  which,  according  as  we  will,  may  or 
may  not  become  an  oak.  We  do  not  know  our  brain 
capacity  until  we  have  put  it  to  the  utmost  test 
of  our  will  capacity.  Whether  or  no  you  read 
trashy  books  in  one  language,  or  read  the  world's 
best  books  in  half  a  dozen  languages,  is  an  affair  of 
your  own  choice.  To  learn  is  as  easy  as  to  eat, 
if  we  give  ourselves  to  it.  And  talking  of  eating, 
it  may  be  well  to  remind  ourselves  of  that  saying 
of  Plato  in  the  "  Protagoras,"  about  the  right  food 
for  the  soul.  We  can,  says  he,  when  we  buy  pro- 
vision for  the  body  in  the  market,  take  it  away 
with  us,  store  it,  and  use  it  or  not  use  it,  as  we 
think  fit.  But  the  soul's  food,  the  doctrine  we  get 
from  books  or  from  teachers,  enters  at  once  directly 
into  us,  and  we  cannot  escape  its  effects  for  good 
or  ill.  And  so  we  need  here  with  the  greater  care 
to  choose  our  food.  That  choice,  again,  is  an 
affair  of  the  will.  What  mental  company  are  we 
keeping  ?  Do  we  live  habitually  with  the  great  souls, 


OF  SELF-CREATION  301 

forming  ourselves  on  their  noble  ideals,  drawing 
into  us  the  sap  of  their  strength,  breathing  the  divine 
air  they  live  in  ?  Or  are  we  content  with  the 
garbage  and  the  loathsome  fog-atmosphere  of  the 
world's  literary  slums  ? 

In  closing,  let  it  be  observed  that  there  is  an 
all-important  side  of  this  question,  a  religious 
side,  which  we  have  not  touched.  We  have  let  it  alone 
in  order  to  emphasize  a  feature  in  self-creation 
which  religious  teachers  are  apt  to  neglect.  We 
agree  with  them  fully  in  their  main  assertion  that 
man's  re-creation  is  ultimately  a  Divine  business. 
The  receptive  capacity  on  which  our  highest  hopes 
depend  is  before  all  things  a  capacity  to  receive  the 
power  from  above,  the  secret,  silent  energy  of  the 
Spirit.  But  the  tendency  of  the  hour  in  many 
religious  circles  is  to  keep  man  on  the  move  by 
outside  pressures,  the  emotionalism  of  revival 
meetings,  the  dram-drinking  of  high-wrought 
excitements.  Whereas  what  we  want  above  all 
things  to-day  is  a  machinery  that  works  from 
within.  Says  a  French  writer,  "  Aujourd'hui 
rhomme  desire  immensement,  mais  il  veut  faible- 
ment"  The  need  of  our  time  is  great  willing. 
Here,  in  the  deeps  of  us,  let  us  in  the  strength  of 
God  weave  the  garment  of  our  manhood,  our 
vesture  of  eternity. 


XXXIV 
The  Farther    Side 

HAVE  any  of  our  readers  been  through  the 
clouds  and  seen  them  from  their  upper  side  ? 
It  is  a  marvellous  experience,  of  which  the  balloonist 
has  not  the  entire  monopoly.  The  spectacle  is 
granted  sometimes  to  the  mountaineer.  The  present 
writer  has  vivid  remembrance  of  a  dull  November 
afternoon  in  the  Jura,  when,  plunging  into  the 
heavy  cloud  which  all  day  had  hid  sun  and  sky, 
he  toiled  upwards,  till  suddenly,  in  one  dazzling 
moment,  he  found  himself  outside  and  above  it  all. 
He  was  in  a  realm  of  glorious  sunshine.  Above  was 
the  dazzling  blue  ;  away  to  his  right  lay  a  rolling  sea 
of  magnificent  cloud  colours ;  at  the  far  side  of 
this  sea,  gleaming  in  the  white  radiance  of  their 
snow  raiment,  rose  the  whole  mighty  range  of  the 
Alps.  What  a  scene,  and  what  a  parable  !  This 
same  cloud,  which,  from  one  side  and  in  one  aspect, 
glowered  over  the  world  as  the  image  of  all  that 
was  gloomy  and  forbidding,  required  only  another 
view-point  to  stand  revealed  as  in  itself  beautiful 
beyond  imagination,  while  serving  as  the  foundation 
of  the  sublimest  of  world-pictures. 
Herein,  we  say,  is  a  parable,  but  we  have  to 

302 


THE  FARTHER  SIDE  303 

take  care  that  we  do  not  press  it  too  far.  It  is 
not  always  by  any  means  that  "  the  farther  side  " 
yields  a  result  of  this  kind.  The  topic,  indeed, 
might  as  easily  be  handled  by  the  pessimist  as  by 
the  optimist.  The  one  as  well  as  the  other  would 
find  abundant  material  if  he  sought  for  it.  Let  us, 
divesting  ourselves  as  far  as  may  be  of  existing 
prepossessions,  try  impartially  to  examine  the 
ground  for  ourselves,  and  see  what  we  find  there. 
To  begin  with,  we  have  to  note  that  every  ex- 
perience of  life  has  its  farther  side,  a  side  which 
invariably  differs  radically  and  essentially  from 
the  nearer  one.  Life,  as  Heraclitus  long  ago  taught 
us,  "  is  an  eternal  flux."  When  people  complain  of 
the  changefulness,  the  restlessness  of  the  world, 
they  forget  that  this  is  the  very  condition  of  its 
existence.  If  change  ceased,  we  should  cease ; 
for  life,  whether  of  the  separate  germ-cell  or  of  the 
entire  organism  of  the  universe,  is  movement 
first  and  last.  We  can  never  keep  a  sensation 
or  an  experience  in  one  stay.  Each  has  its  be- 
ginning, its  culmination,  its  end.  What  finally  re- 
mains of  them  is  a  deposit,  and  it  is  out  of  these 
deposits  that  our  soul  is  built.  And  as  it  is  with  a 
single  sensation  felt  in  our  own  mind,  so  is  it  on  an 
ever-widening  scale  with  all  that  takes  place  in 
history  and  the  corporate  life  of  humanity.  Our 
race,  we  discover,  has  conditions  of  feeling,  epochs 
of  ideas,  which  may  last  for  centuries  or  millenniums, 
but  which,  nevertheless,  are  always  moving.  They 
all  partake  of  the  inevitable  process ;  they  have 
their  rise,  their  culmination,  their  decay.  In  their 
extinction  these  also  leave  their  deposit,  to  be 


304        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

taken  up  into  new  births  of  the  world's  life.  Man 
has  by  now  had  a  tolerably  wide  experience  of  this 
movement,  and  it  is  time  we  had  learned  some 
lessons  from  it.  Let  us  see,  in  some  particulars, 
how  the  matter  stands. 

Youth  has  at  once  the  advantage  and  disadvan- 
tage of  beginning  on  the  near  side  of  everything. 
It  is  not.tall  enough  to  see  over  the  wall,  and  knows 
only~*6f  that  side  by  report.  And  commonly  it 
takes  the  report  somewhat  cheaply.  ;'  Youth," 
says  Turgeneff,  "  imagines  life  to  be  an  affair  of 
gilt  gingerbread.  It  will  be  glad  afterwards  if  it 
finds  dry  bread  to  eat."  In  those  charmed  hours  the 
great  pleasure-sensations,  the  intoxications  of  eye, 
ear  and  touch,  the  raptures  of  satisfied  desire,  seem 
everything.  They  show  their  front  view,  and  the 
view  is  full  of  charm.  But  "  Onward  !  "  is  the 
life  watchword.  To  every  this  a  that ;  to  every  act 
a  consequence ;  to  every  experience  "  the  moment 
after."  There  is  one  judgment  of  life  while  the 
draught  is  being  drunk ;  there  is  that  other  of  the 
lendemain  de  fete  when  the  cup  is  drained.  Have 
we  been  able  to  assimilate  these  two  things  and 
draw  from  their  union  some  wholesome  result  ? 

The  world  has  now,  through  many  thousands  of 
years,  been  grinding  its  lesson  into  our  race,  and 
there  is  no  mistake  about  the  trend  of  its  teaching. 
Our  philosophies  and  theologies  offer  us  endless 
puzzles,  but  on  the  essential  things  we  have,  out 
of  the  heart  of  life  itself,  the  simplest  and  clearest  of 
messages.  Life  gives  us  its  own  gospel  of  the 
farther  side.  If  we  would  find  it  a  good  side  we 
must  approach  it  in  one  way.  You  must  enter  our 


THE  FARTHER  SIDE  305 

cloud  from  the  lower,  the  sombre  end  of  it.  It  is  a 
climb.  Nature  always  starts  her  chosen  ones 
upon  drudgery.  Literature  begins  upon  them 
with  grammars  and  dictionaries.  Music  is  a  pound- 
ing of  scales,  long  hours  of  weary  repetitions. 
There  is  no  royal  road.  The  cloud  is  before  us  to 
trudge  through.  But  if  we  do  manfully  trudge 
through  we  find  always  at  the  end  the  white  moun- 
tains and  the  blue  sky.  Through  drudgery,  incessant 
self-discipline,  we  come  to  our  power,  to  our  wealth 
of  acquisition,  to  our  sources  of  high-enduring 
enjoyment.  The  lesson  is  so  plain  that  one  is 
amazed  that  people  anywhere  fail  to  see  it.  The 
best,  men  of  every  age  and  creed  always  have  seenv 
it.  Marcus  Aurelius,  in  reckoning  up  his  supreme 
advantages,  does  not  speak  of  his  accession  to  / 
wealth  and  empire,  but  of  the  fact  that  as  a  youth 
he  was  taught  to  endure  hardness,  to  work  with  i 
his  hands  and  to  mind  his  own  business. 

With  the  same  deadly  certainty  does  the  nature 
of  things  express  the  other  half  of  its  doctrine  here. 
It  lias  put  up  its  strait  gate  and  narrow  way,  and 
shows  no  mercy  to  trespassers  or  those  who  would 
"  climb  up  some  other  way."  It  knows  the  skulker 
by  sight,  and  has  its  own  manner  of  treating  him. 
Calvinism  used  to  talk  of  the  eternal  decrees,  and 
there  certainly  are  some.  The  decree  of  the  farther 
side  to  toil  and  self-restraint  is  one  ;  the  decree  of 
the  farther  side  to  laziness  and  indulgence  is 
another.  Some  of  the  present  generation  appear 
to  proceed  on  the  supposition  that  this  decree  has 
recently  been  annulled.  They  will  discover  in  due 
time  that  it  is  still  in  full  force,  and  that  there 

20 


306        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

is  no  remotest  corner  of  the  universe  where  it  fails 
to  operate. 

But  this  is  a  road  already  trodden  hard  by  the 
moralists.  Life  offers  us  some  more  complex  pro- 
blems than  that  of  the  issues  of  hardwork  and 
high  aims  versus  idleness  and  sensualism.  The 
high  aims  themselves  have  their  far  side,  which 
is  not  always  roseate.  The  middle-aged  man  of 
our  generation  looks  back  on  a  dozen  enthusiasms 
and  beliefs  of  his  youth  which,  in  the  backward 
glance,  wear  a  quite  different  aspect  now  from 
then.  If  he  were  now  to  write  the  history  of  them 
he  would  write  largely  as  an  outsider.  He  has 
come  to  understand  that  pregnant  saying  of  Carlyle  : 
"  A  man,  I  think,  is  ready  to  write  on  a  thing 
when  he  perceives  he  has  got  above  it,  that  he  has 
shaken  it  off  from  him,  and  can  survey  it  with- 
out egoism,  spleen,  exaggeration,  or  other  per- 
version." How  absolute  we  were  in  those  days 
in  our  judgment  of  men  and  things  !  How  sure 
of  our  own  side  !  We  took  all  our  teachers  told 
us  for  gospel.  We  accepted  their  reading  of 
history.  The  men  of  our  party  were  heroes,  opposed 
to  them  were  the  powers  of  darkness.  To-day  we 
are  less  sure  of  our  good  and  bad.  We  discover 
that  our  side,  as  well  as  the  other,  is,  and  has  been, 
so  very  human  !  We  find  with  Baxter  that  the 
good  men  are  not  so  good  as  we  thought  them, 
nor  the  bad  so  ill.  We  say  with  Johnson  :  "As 
I  know  more  of  mankind  I  expect  less  of  them, 
and  am  ready  now  to  call  a  man  a  good  man  on 
easier  terms  than  formerly." 

But  to  a  properly-developed  soul  the  view  from 


THE  FARTHER  SIDE  307 

the  farther  side,  while  inducing  scepticism  about 
many  things,  will  bring  no  scepticism  about  life 
itself.  We  may  grow  doubtful  about  this  or 
that  patent  scheme  of  reform.  We  may,  to  quote 
Johnson  again,  go  so  far  as  to  say  with  him,  "  Why, 
sir,  most  schemes  of  political  improvement  are  very 
laughable  things."  Ballot  Acts,  Franchise  Acts, 
the  upsetting  of  this  Government  and  the  setting 
up  of  that ;  we  have  lived  through  so  much  of  this, 
to  discover  how  different  are  the  results  from  what 
was  hoped  for.  And  yet  do  we  despair  of  politics  ? 
Not  at  all.  Reform  will  go  on  in  that  sphere, 
though  not  by  the  clash  of  parties.  It  is  and  has 
ever  been  by  a  spiritual  process.  Socrates  utters 
the  secret  of  it  when,  in  the  "  Gorgias,"  he  de- 
clares that  he  is  the  only  politician  in  Athens, 
for  while  others  intrigue  and  seek  for  votes  he 
seeks  to  improve  the  State  by  improving  the  souls 
of  the  citizens. 

In  the  long  run,  when  we  have  got  to  the 
farther  side  of  all  our  experiments,  we  shall  dis- 
cover that  this  is  the  only  way.  And  it  is  the  way 
which  the  world  will  assuredly  reach  in  the  end. 
Is  it  not  a  wonderful  thing  that,  whatever  new  road 
man  breaks  open  for  himself,  if  he  follow  it  far 
enough,  it  always  leads  him  out  at  the  farther  side 
to  a  spiritual  result  ?  A  generation  ago  it  seemed 
as  though  we  were  being  engulfed  in  materialism. 
The  prophets  of  science  were  proclaiming  it  as  the 
latest  news  of  the  universe.  Moleschott's  aphorism, 
"  no  thought  without  phosphorus,"  was  solemnly 
repeated  ^as  though  it  settled  everything.  But 
to-day  science,  not  by  backing  out  of  its  tunnel,  but 


308        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

by  going  forward  in  it,  by  becoming  more  scientific 
still,  finds  itself  emerging  at  the  farther  end  once 
more  into  full  daylight.  From  the  scientists  we 
are  obtaining,  bit  by  bit,  a  conception  of  matter,  of 
man  and  of  the  universe  which  will  become  the 
surest  foundation  of  the  theology  of  the  future. 

It  is,  as  we  have  said,  not  by  running  away 
from  investigation,  but  by  going  forward  in  it, 
that  faith,  however  seemingly  shaken  and  dis- 
lodged for  a  time,  comes  eventually  again  into  its 
kingdom.  The  farther  side  is  always  its  side. 
Nothing  is  more  common,  for  instance,  than  for 
people  to  be  thrown  off  their  religious  balance  by 
FO -called  "  explanations  "  of  the  things  they  have 
believed.  Some  one  writes  a  history  of  God — 
a  history,  that  is,  of  the  human  theistic  belief — 
and  imagines  that  in  this  way  he  has  extinguished 
theism.  One  might  as  well  propose  to  extin- 
guish the  universe  by  tracing  the  evolution  of  the 
eye  that  sees  it.  We  forget  how  very  small  the 
distance  is  over  which  our  "  explanations  "  carry 
us  ;  how  vast  the  background  behind.  Just  now 
some  psychologists  are  explaining  for  us  the  phe- 
nomena of  revivals.  They  are  an  affair  of  psychic 
force  and  of  the  subtle  interaction  of  crowds.  Each 
individual  is  a  magnet,  a  centre  of  odic  powers. 
Under  certain  conditions  these  emanations  are 
even  visible.  When  a  multitude  of  persons  are 
together,  all  governed  by  the  same  fixed  ideas, 
and  stirred  to  a  given  condition  of  feeling,  the 
fused,  subliminal  consciousness  of  the  company 
develops  abnormal  powers  sufficient  to  account  for 
all  the  phenomena.  But  what  then  !  When  we 


THE  FARTHER  SIDE  309 

have  accepted  all  this  are  we  at  the  end  of  our 
fact ;  have  we  done  away  with  our  revival  ?  We 
talk  of  our  "  fixed  ideas  "  ;  where  did  they  come 
from  ?  We  speak  of  "  the  subliminal  conscious- 
ness "  ;  what  has  moved  it  in  this  particular  direc- 
tion ?  Why,  we  still  ask,  are  men,  under  the 
action  of  this  consciousness,  breaking  from  their 
old  sins  and  leading  a  new  life  ?  To  give  us  the 
"  subliminal  consciousness  "  as  the  substitute  here 
for  God  is  as  though  one  should  offer  an  account 
of  the  keyboard  and  wires  of  a  piano  as  accounting, 
without  Beethoven,  for  the  "  Moonlight  Sonata." 

After  finding  ourselves  at  the  far  side  successively 
of  innumerable  early  emotions,  enthusiasms,  de- 
lusions, we  wake  up  to  the  feeling  that  we  are  getting 
towards  the  far  side  of  life  itself.  It  is  a  reg'on 
which,  to  traverse  successfully,  requires  abundant 
preparation.  If  we  are  to  escape  the  "  trixtis 
senectus  "  of  which  Virgil,  in  some  memorable  lines, 
complains  so  bitterly,  we  must  begin  the  prepara- 
tion early.  As  we  approach  the  region  we  ex- 
perience some  new,  singular  sensations.  One  of 
the  strongest  of  them,  with  pome  of  us,  is  that  of 
the  immense,  ever  increasing  value  of  time.  Our 
account  in  years  is  diminishing  so  rapidly.  We 
feel  with  Seneca  "  how  many  people  have  been 
allowed  to  pillage  your  life  while  you  were  not  even 
aware  you  were  being  robbed  !  "  We  realise  how 
much  has  gone  on  the  mere  apparatus  of  living, 
instead  of  being  devoted  to  life  itself,  the  highest 
life  !  There  must  be  no  more  waste.  What  re- 
mains of  time  must  be  concentrated  on  the  best 
things.  This  "  farther  side  "  is  clearly  the  place 


310        RELIGION  AND  EXPERIENCE 

for  faith,  for  the  clearer  vision.  We  draw  near  the 
lower  edge  of  the  cloud,  which,  when  it  finally 
enfolds  us,  will  shut  out  the  view  of  all  this  under 
world.  But  we  shall  enter  it  with  a  good 
heart,  knowing  as  we  do  of  that  upper  side,  where 
stand  the  white  mountains  overarched  by  the 
cloudless  blue. 


W.    SPEA1OHT   AND   SONS, 

PKISTEKS, 
FETTEU   LAKE,   LONDON,  B.C. 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LJBHABY  FACILITY 


A     000  752  389     7 


